Nibbles: Amman again, DNA hype, Blight-resistant spuds, Seeds, Sorghum, Brassicas, UK Food Security

Crop Genebank’s Knowledge Base enjoys an outing in Amman.
Great Headlines of our Time: Researchers fight world hunger by mapping the soybean genome.
Blight-resistant potatoes from Hungary to the UK.
Danish Seed Savers 2010 list available.
“We want to make sorghum to be even better than maize,” says Kenyan gene jockey. Why?
“The dog is the brassica of the vertebrate world.” Jeremy says: “Never met one I didn’t like … cooked right.”
James sprouts off on brassicas too.
New UK approach to food security: apples.

A paean to diverse diets is just what we all need.
And another one, from the MIT Technology Review of all places.
Menawhile, there’s only one reference to dietary diversity in the World Bank’s investment framework for nutrition.
Maybe you have to quantify that diversity before you can save it? Now where have I heard that before?
Meanwhile, Europe reports on biodiversity-friendly farming practices. Does that include the biodiversity of the actual crops? Perhaps surprisingly, yes!
You want biodiversity-friendly farming practices? Talk to Indigenous people. The Committee on World Food Security (CFS) has launched an e-consultation on “Preserving, strengthening and promoting Indigenous Peoples’ food and knowledge systems and traditional practices for sustainable food systems.”
There’s diversity in asparagus too.
Genebanks can help with those biodiversity-friendly practices, diverse diets and rops and Indigenous practices.
Even big international genebanks.
Even the Svalbard Global Seed Vault.
But some are in trouble.
Though others are coming back.