Climate change

June 9, 2014June 9, 2014

Nibbles: Genomes galore: beans, sheep, citrus, Breeding from “weeds”, Talks, Old wheat, Adaptation, Popped sorghum, Managing BXW

Can’t move for genomes today.

First off, Phaseolus vulgaris.
Next up, sheep: one genome, three stories:

And citrus diversity: “Citrus has incestuous genes. Nothing is pure.”

But there is other stuff too.

How weeds could feed billions. Not by eating them but by breeding from them. Are crop wild relatives really all weeds?
TED talks on biodiversity. I suppose we should be grateful for 1.5 out of 30.
A New York baker has been exploring tumminia wheat. Without telling us.
Adaptation to climate change hardly worth it, according to econ 101.
So you want to make your own popped sorghum? All you need is a microwave and a paper bag.
ProMusa reports on an easier and better way for banana farmers to manage Xanthomonas wilt.

June 7, 2014June 7, 2014

Nibbles: Neolithic farmers, Minoan DNA, Cretan food, Olive history book, Organic dreams, Fairtrade experiment, Value chains, Jamaican breadfruit exports, Climate smart successes

Neolithic farmers spread into Europe by sea.
And it looks like the ones who got to Crete eventually gave rise to the Minoans.
And ate food not unlike what Cretans ate up to a hundred years ago.
Well of course the olive is important to all that.
Ten thousand years later, we find that organic is an impossible dream.
And Fairtrade may or may not work.
But value chains will make you free. Although that’s easier said than done.
And you have to be climate-smart to boot. Really, who’d be a farmer, in the Neolithic or now.

June 3, 2014

Nibbles: Early ag, Land data, CAP, African droughts, Risotto, Cowpea research, Reforestation

Conditions at the dawn of Fertile Crescent agriculture were wetter and more, well, fertile. Been downhill ever since.
Digitizing land data may not be good for women.
European agricultural policies bad for diets.
Africa will continue to face droughts. Looks like nobody can catch a break today.
Ah, ok, here’s something good. Italian rice a hit in China. Gotta get your victories where you can.
And some feel-good stuff on cowpea research in Mozambique.
And to conclude our return from the slough of despond, some encouraging news about forest restoration.

May 27, 2014May 28, 2014

Nibbles: Linux lettuce, Climate intelligence, European ag & CC, Italian forests, Sweet potato chains, Aroid podcast, Beer trifecta, CWR everywhere

Totally forgot if we already linked to this latest pean to open source seed.
Climate-smart agriculture described in three paragraphs.
Hope someone explains it to European farmers, and soon.
Italy is increasingly wooded. But only because farms are being abandoned. Maybe not climate-smart enough?
If only those farms had better links to markets, like in E. Africa…
Dutch food writer on the Jewish (maybe) origins of the Surinamese national dish. Gotta love edible aroids. Jeremy does his podcast thing.
Step 1: Breed your hops.
Step 2: Find a funky yeast.
Step 3: Crack the Kenyan beer market.
Back to real life: USAID’s brand new multisectoral nutrition policy. Now, then, what’s the betting that the agricultural interventions supported by USAID avoided the risks that such things often hold for nutrition (incomes, prices, types of products, women social status and workload, sanitary environment and inequalities)?
SeedMap.org breaks down crop wild relatives.
Somebody mention crop wild relatives? Yes, Sandy Knapp.
Somebody mention parientes silvestres de cultivos? Yes, Nora Castañeda.
How many CWR will go the way of Arabidopsis? Because southern populations of that species in genebanks are already doing better than local populations in northern sites.
How many crop wild relatives in Kew’s meadows?

May 19, 2014April 24, 2014

Brainfood: Ethiopian coffee, Kenyan climate change, Biofortification, Pasture legume adoption, Moroccan veggies, Economics of pests, Grassland diversity & fire, Seed storage, Resistant beans, Maize OPVs, Low P tolerance in NERICA, Brazilian beans

Prospects for forest-based ecosystem services in forest-coffee mosaics as forest loss continues in southwestern Ethiopia. Coffee agroforests provide about half to two thirds of the ecosystem services of plain old forests.
Social Process of Adaptation to Environmental Changes: How Eastern African Societies Intervene between Crops and Climate. Your seeds may not be able to cut it in the future.
Bioavailability of iron, zinc, and provitamin A carotenoids in biofortified staple crops. Focus on breeding varieties with elevated micronutrient concentrations is justified. Phew.
The future of warm-season, tropical and subtropical forage legumes in sustainable pastures and rangelands. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. And the past, in this case, was full of mistakes.
Wild leafy vegetable use and knowledge across multiple sites in Morocco: a case study for transmission of local knowledge? The Rif Mts are a hotspot of weed diversity. Not that kind of weed, settle down. No, wait…
Agricultural Trade, Biodiversity Effects and Food Price Volatility. Pests are damaging to neat economic models. Pesticides fix that but damage the environment. No word on the economics of natural enemies, integrated pest management, varietal diversity etc.
Annual burning drives plant communities in remnant grassland ecological networks in an afforested landscape. In the southern Afromontane region, annual burning does not reduce the species diversity of grassland patches, but does make these patches look more and more alike. Add heavy cattle grazing though and that does reduce diversity.
Responses to fire differ between South African and North American grassland communities. Decreasing fire frequency increased species diversity in Kansas, decreased it in Kwa-Zulu Natal. It’s because of the rhizomatous species in America. What does this and above mean for crop wild relatives?
Prolonging the longevity of ex situ conserved seeds by storage under anoxia. Remove oxygen to make seeds last longer in genebanks.
Identification of Sources of Bacterial Wilt Resistance in Common Beans (Phaseolus vulgaris L.). Only 1 resistant accession out of 500 in the USDA collection. And it’s a wild one.
Evaluation of Evolution and Diversity of Maize Open-Pollinated Varieties Cultivated under Contrasted Environmental and Farmers’ Selection Pressures: A Phenotypical Approach. OPVs are diverse and change over time. Still no cure for cancer.
A novel allele of the P-starvation tolerance gene OsPSTOL1 from African rice (Oryza glaberrima Steud) and its distribution in the genus Oryza. Kasalath comes to the rescue of NERICA. Must be the only sativa gene NOT in NERICA.
Agronomic potential of genebank landrace elite accessions for common bean genetic breeding. Yeah, but are they in the Brazilian genebank? Doesn’t look like it.