Nibbles: Dutch soybeans, American flora and vegetation, Cassava pests, Bangladesh biocrats

Do you have a small parcel of land in the Netherlands that you would not mind being used to test soybean varieties? Non-GMO, mind.
Kew has a couple of new online resources on Neotropical plants.
We need an international early warning system for cassava problems.
“Is there anyone in Bangladesh to look deep into the workings of the biocrats who are bent on advancing the cause of giant companies at the expense of the people’s long-term food security?”

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.