- Seed Hunter visits genebank. Not many people hurt.
- I’d like to visit this Corn Palace.
- Rice domestication: not once, not twice, three times. Well, really, who’s to say maybe even more than that? Maybe even in Australia?
- Solomon Islands cacao wins award. Looking forward to tasting it one day. But is it certified?
- Bread, Wine, Chocolate: The Giveaway.
- Researchers hoping to science the shit out of threat to Thanksgiving.
- Genetic resources and gastronomy in Brazil.
- Pineapple gets a genome.
- Sunflower saves soybean? What wizardry is this?
I visited the Corn Palace last year on my move from Ontario to Oregon. The youth basketball game and hip-hop music going on inside of the palace was quite a contrast to the exterior. I still have a bag of authentic microwave corn palace popcorn — I would love to sent it to you, Luigi.
“Genetic resources and gastronomy in Brazil.” Nice article. I like that it’s a different way of incorporating biodiversity on our everyday life, without going through the breeding pathway. The more ways to incorporate them, the better.
Speaking of biodiversity and breeding, have you read the last article in the BSPB autumn newsletter? (3rd Nov) http://www.bspb.co.uk/sg_userfiles/BSPB_Plant_Breeding_Matters_Autumn_2015.pdf
I find myself in a very curious position regarding this matter. As you know, I come from Brazil, which is a country that has available biodiversity, while working for a UK breeding company, which would be benefited by freedom to operate. So It’s a funny situation to be in. I can’t completely agree with Penny, because I come from a country that had it’s natural resources exploited to exhaustion, but I understand the value of incorporating diversity in breeding – and since I work in pre-breeding, I’m trying to do that myself! Trying to look for material to incorporate in out programme has shown me how much stuff is gated away from breeding.
So, as we say in Brazil, we have a cucumber in our hands. It means we have a messy/complicated situation. Don’t ask me what that has to do with cucumbers.
Gabi: Penny gives the example of a breeder wanting to collect (and then use) Aegilops from Morocco. Depending on what `Triticum et al.’ means in Annex i of the ITPGRFA, Aegilops is probably outside the Treaty. Existing ex-situ collections now outside Morocco are out of their national control (the CBD/Nagoya is not retroactive – unlike the Treaty). If a breeder wants Aegilops the place to start is the USDA collections: I guess there are very many indeed. CIMMYT collections (Art. 15 of the Treaty) can also be used for free unless results are to be patented – not likely for wheat in Britain. And I don’t see that Morocco (as a tourist destination) can stop anyone getting goatgrass awns stuck in their socks on a hike and taking them home. I remember seeing carpets of the stuff on a picnic in the Anti-Lebanon mountains of Iraq.
But Brazil should do something to help the rest of the world in exchange for all that exportable soybean from genetic resources from SE Asia – what is it now? – 60 million tons.
“But Brazil should do something to help the rest of the world in exchange for all that exportable soybean from genetic resources from SE Asia – what is it now? – 60 million tons.”
Touche.
I’m not an expert on Brazilian agriculture or germplasm because I really only got involved with both areas after I moved to the UK and had the chance to learn from Mike Ambrose at the JIC seedbank. I need to do a lot of background research to have a proper discussion. My comment about being from Brazil had much more to do with the fact that I understand the general _feeling_ of provider countries, which don’t want to be exploited for genetic resources without any returns.
“Existing ex-situ collections now outside Morocco are out of their national control (the CBD/Nagoya is not retroactive – unlike the Treaty)”
This is great information, thank you. I wasn’t aware of that major difference between CBD/Nagoya and the Treaty. What about ex-situ collections that are in the native country? Those are still under Nagoya etc, I’d asume?
I actually work with Barley and not Wheat, but they are close enough that all your suggestions are very useful! Thanks for taking the time.
Gabi: Thanks. “What about ex-situ collections that are in the native country? Those are still under Nagoya etc, I’d assume?” Pretty sure they are but the big problem for agriculture is there is an almost total lockdown on access to these from developing countries (and India and Brazil). The Treaty is not working, the CBD and Nagoya have still to sort out access and benefit-sharing and we are left with mining existing ex-situ collections outside the country of origin. This might keep the wolf from the door for a decade or two but eventually we will need fresh material. I am currently working on trying to show the vast importance of introduced crops to crop exports from most countries, developed and developing. For example, rice in Uruguay: 1.3 millions tonnes, 95% exported each year.
Hi Dave, I’d be very interested in reading what you put together.
Hopefully ABS is going to shape up, and will be something that helps instead of hinders. But maybe that’s just wishful thinking.
The Corn Palace is not a destination, but definitely worth pulling off the interstate to see, a chance to stretch your legs on the way from civilization to the Bad Lands, a place also definitely worth seeing.