Nibbles: Cuba gardens, Dual purpose pumpkins, GRIN-Global, Wheat belly, Agroforestry, Zambian malnutrition, Libyan agriculture, Certification

Visit Cuba with boffins of the University of Washington Botanic Gardens. Well that sounds like fun.
You liked naked oats? Get a load of naked pumpkins. Comments disabled for Manitoba farmers.
Psst, wanna genebank data management system? Only slightly used…
Something else you can blame your beer belly on: wheat.
Have your forest and eat it too.
Solving malnutrition in Zambia. I wanna know more about those “improved seed varieties.”
And about these too for that matter: “…ICARDA is urgently sending to Libya seeds of wheat, barley, legume and forage crops for the 2011-2012 cropping season…” Incidentally, any news about the Agricultural Research Centre in Tripoli?
Forest certification helps nearby Heritage Sites.

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.