Breeding

September 25, 2012September 25, 2012

Accessing mutant barley

A post over at Plantwise reminded me that I wanted to link to an IAEA video on the mutation-breeding of the Peruvian barley variety called Centenario. Simply because it’s an interesting story, reasonably well told.

Alas, the mutants involved do not seem to feature in the FAO/IAEA Mutant Germplasm Repository Database. If they did, they would be available from the Multilateral System of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture.

LATER: It has been pointed out to me that Centenario does feature in a different database maintained by the FAO/IAEA Joint Division. That’s not the stuff in the International Treaty, though.

September 24, 2012September 24, 2012

Nibble: Colombian cassava, ITPGRFA in Costa Rica, Inca foods, Chaffey, Plantation, Artificial meadows, Squash, Wheat genome, Papyrus islands

Caribbean coast of Colombia high in cassava genetic diversity. Shakira alerted.
Costa Rica getting to grips with ITPGRFA. Not many people hurt.
Fox News Latino has a dietician tell us about Inca foods. In other news, Fox News has a Latino bit.
Plant Cuttings!
Did you celebrate the International Day of Struggle against Monoculture Tree Plantations? And does what’s happening with açaí qualify as plantations?
The London Olympics backlash begins. If you don’t agree with all that, here’s how to make your own meadow. Or restore one. Any crop wild relatives in all meadow-making?
Nice pic of squash diversity.
Very geeky presentation on how sequencing the wheat genome is going to solve all our problems. If you can follow it, you’re already convinced.
Floating plastic islands full of papyrus plants will save Lake Naivasha. I don’t know, but I’d sure like to see it.

September 21, 2012September 21, 2012

Nibbles: Polyploidy study, Agrobiodiversity policy, Organic livestock, Innovation, Buffett on small farms

$2 million to study strawberries sounds like quite a lot, but then it is to investigate polyploidy in general.
Agroforesters hear about IPR and agrobiodiversity. Probably not for the first, or last, time.
Let’s not forget that even animal husbandry can be organic.
“A lack of evidence to convince policymakers holds back progress on grassroots innovation in agriculture.” Weird; doesn’t seem to hold them back on anything else.
What Howard G. Buffett knows about small farms. Campaign for Real Farming has made his words available.

September 20, 2012September 20, 2012

Nibbles: Diversification talk, Gene award, Community genebanks, GCARD, Natural products, Nutrition talk, Wild bees, GM for drought fail, Face of breeding, Cheese, Bird, Cacao smuggling, CWRs, Perreniation

ICRISAT DG agrees with Bioversity DG. Kinda. CGIAR DGs communicating via blog. Who’d have thunk it.
Borlaug Global Rust Initiative gives its first Gene Stewardship Award to Nepali breeders. I wonder if they work with community genebanks at all. Or what they think about them. Or even if they know they are there.
GCARD 2 is coming, socially networked up the wazoo. Be afraid.
Authenticating natural health products via barcoding.
FAO discussion on making agriculture work for nutrition.
Nice photos of wild bees.
Not sure if we already linked to the big report on why biotechnology is not delivering drought-resistant crops.
Meet a Breeder. Conventional, natch.
Who moved my artisanal cheese?
Bird diversity on intensive farms like happy Tolstoyan familes: the same everywhere.
What’s a poor cacao farmer to do? Obey the law and make a loss, or break it in the hope of breaking even?
Kew does the crop wild relatives thing for Plantwise, and check out that picture!
Nature discovers perreniation as salvation of African soils; can resilieficiency be far behind?

September 19, 2012September 19, 2012

Nibbles: Yams, Wild relatives, Plant breeding, Bamboo, Funding, Leaves, Red rice, Rice breeder, Governance and poverty

Yams heading for trouble. What to do?
Learn something from wild relatives, like they’re doing with tomatoes?
Go for a totally new plant breeding paradigm?
I know, let’s all go out and celebrate World Bamboo Day!
Switzerland gives Laos US$6.3m in support of government’s agrobiodiversity initiative.
W.K. Kellogg Foundation gives Growing Power US$5m in support of Growing Power’s urban agriculture efforts.
National Geographic gives leaves a good going-over without mentioning agriculture.
Farmers in Kerala give Navara red rice as a reason for good health and prosperity.
World gives Monty Jones, rice breeder, high status.
Paul Collier fan gives African governance the blame for low agricultural productivity.