Luigi Guarino – Page 1139 – Agricultural Biodiversity Weblog

November 20, 2007

New, bigger ancho pepper

Size is important, at least in peppers.

November 19, 2007November 19, 2007

Many trees grow in Brooklyn

Crop wild relatives etc. in Prospect Park. Betty Smith unavailable for comment.

November 19, 2007

Elephants don’t like it hot

Paris Hilton, then hot peppers. Indian elephants can’t catch a break.

November 19, 2007November 19, 2007

Teaching conservation

School play: biotech for agrobiodiversity conservation. Brecht unavailable for comment.

November 19, 2007

Chimp food gathering behaviour studied

Chimps dig tubers. In both senses.

1. A North Macedonian professor’s 15-year rescue mission for landraces and crops surviving only in remote villages. Why bother? Stay tuned…
2. Ancient grapevines in Tigray represent a unique genetic lineage with potential value for breeding varieties adapted to dryland conditions.
3. Hawai’i Public Radio checks in on Maui’s coconut genebank. Useful to breed varieties adapted to really wet conditions, presumably.
4. The Cayman Islands are also hoarding coconuts, along with lots of tasty fruits.
5. A USD 400,000 boost from Taiwan for the Eswatini national genebank. Indigenous vegetables get much-needed love.
6. A regional survey of 25 orphan crops across 13 Latin American countries finds quinoa and amaranth well-catalogued, but characterization budgets are the real bottleneck. Collecting and conserving in genebanks is great, but not enough.
7. South Korea puts 330,000 seed accessions under “double lock”, hedging against both climate change and war. Conserving in one place is not enough.
8. FAO warns that nearly a third of the world can’t afford the USD 4.28 a day that a healthy diet costs — nearly three billion people, and rising. That’s why we need al the above, I guess.
Published on July 28, 2026