AUSTRALIA will this week send the first of a series of deposits to the international seed bank, a chilled Norwegian bunker near the North Pole, where the globe stores its ''spare'' seeds as an insurance against disease and disaster.

The deposit comes from stock stored at the Horsham seed bank and includes a rare Australian chickpea.

Dr Bob Redden at the Horsham seed bank. Credit:Johan Leferink

The seeds will be sent on Friday to the remote island of Spitsbergen, 1300 kilometres from the North Pole.

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault, often called the ''doomsday vault'', is a converted coalmine that has stored a collection of the world's seeds since 1984.