#seedvault

Sandy McLeod in the documentary Seeds of Time explains how if we don’t take action we could lose our food supply due to changes in climate, pests, and disease. McLeod supports her argument by showing several locations varying in climate and how each community is struggling, particularly Peru. The filmmaker’s purpose is to inform the public in order to bring awareness and hopefully action to improve the situation. The film has a formal tone for those who want to learn more on sustainability and agriculture.

Cary Fowler is the focus of this documentary and is the head of an international consortium to store seeds from every agricultural plant in the world. He guides this documentary to various locations around the world. He is first shown with his two sons fishing, making dinner, etc. He seemed like a very family oriented man. Then the rest of the documentary is him working on preserving agriculture. They were trying to have the audience get to know him first before the documentary really started and get a general idea of why he is doing what he does. There is also a part in the documentary where he talks about his cancer and how he was told he had 6 months to live, at this part they show nature taking a turn for the worst to emphasize the fact that he was told he wouldn’t live long. The music then picks up once he says he lived long past 6 months.

One scene that really stood out to me was during the meeting of The Global Crop Diversity Trust, the representative from Philippines, Teresita Borromeo had to discuss how their gene bank was destroyed in a fire. She could not stop crying, it was heartbreaking. Dramatic and sad music accompanied this heart wrenching scene.

Mariano Suta Apucusi and Lino Mamani Marca both in charge of the potato park in Peru. Peru was a major location in this documentary, and with them being natives, they both brought great insight to how their community is dealing with these climate issues on a personal level.

Pamela K. Anderson (International Potato Center) and Alejandro Argumendo were also some great resources in this documentary to give professional insight to why these issues were occurring.

This documentary had a very diverse group of people interviewed, from high up professionals, to farmers in the mountains of Peru.

“Seeds of Time” shed light on an issue I didn’t know we had, losing vital crop diversity. This is a worldwide issue and I’m glad they brought light to it. This documentary touched on several topics but it all came down to the fact that we need more sustainable agriculture. My favorite part was when they discussed the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. According to Crop Trust, this is a secure seed bank on the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen near Longyearbyen in the remote Artic Svalbard. 810 miles from the North Pole and deep inside the side of a mountain. Seeds from all over the globe are sent here for safe keeping preventing extinction. This film informed me much more on various aspects of my topic.

Blog 1: seed vault