The Global Seed Vault, a project run by the nonprofit group, Global Crop Diversity Trust, has begun to collect and store seeds from all over the world in a massive, high-security vault on a Norwegian Island near the North Pole, The New York Times reports.

The vault, built by Norway, and financed by government and private donations including $20-million from Britain, $12-million from Australia, $11-million from Germany and $6.5-million from the United States, will attempt to store and protect every type of seed from every seed collection in the world.

Although networks of seed banks exist across the world, this project is regarded as the first broad effort to gather and systematize information about plants and their genes. Many scientists and governments consider this increasingly valuable as climate change may potentially affect the world’s food supply.

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