Commodity

February 24, 2008February 25, 2008

Nibbles: Genebanks, organic, fair, chocolate

American farming family gets tour of organic research farm and genebank in India, is impressed.
The International Agricultural Show is on, just outside Paris. Pres. Sarkozy available for comment.
A rapid run-through the history of chocolate, courtesy of Smithsonian.

February 18, 2008February 19, 2008

Nibbles: Japan, BBC TV, sauce, basmati, banana

Indoor farms in Tokyo, growing a diversity of non-pot crops, to train yoof. Via.
BBC News web site picks up on BBC World TV documentary on neglected species.
The geography of sauce in South Carolina.
India and Pakistan find something to agree on: basmati rice.
Have we already mentioned this new book on bananas?

February 16, 2008

Oekologie #14

Another of those pesky blog carnivals is up for your reading pleasure. We’re in there, with Luigi’s Modest Proposal to mash walkers with missing species. There’s also an interesting link to Coffee and Conservation, a new one to me, with a close look at just what shade-grown coffee means on the slopes of Panama. Eye-opening.

February 11, 2008February 11, 2008

Building a better chocolate market

It is possible there may be too many ethical cocoa schemes out there. There’s Fairtrade and the Cadbury Cocoa Partnership. And the Good Inside Cocoa Programme, with Mars and Nestle on board. Is it all getting a bit too complicated? Do we have too much of this good thing?

February 11, 2008February 12, 2008

Machine with a taste for espresso

Swiss scientists announce a machine “to predict the sensory profile of espresso coffee.” Luigi comments: “Yeah, right.”

1. What has agrobiodiversity ever done for us? Kent Nnadozie of the Plant Treaty lays it out.
2. Michael Frei of the HealthyDiets4Africa project doesn’t need it laid out.
3. Neither do the people who awarded a prize to Charlotte Allender of the UK Vegetable Genebank.
4. What has the US National Plant Germplasm System ever done for anyone? The Guardian, the NY Times and NPR News lay it out. I guess someone in D.C. needs it laid out, but will it make any difference?
5. Everyone: Potatoes in Florida! Breeders: No problem. NPGS: You called?
6. Here’s The Guardian again, but this time thinking it is making the case for not putting seeds in the fridge, whereas in fact it’s making the case for the complementarity of ex situ and on-farm conservation.
7. Speaking of on-farm conservation, here’s a couple of pieces on community seed banks in Guatemala.
8. Speaking of on-farm conservation, here’s the heart-warming story of Welsh organic farmer Gerald Miles.
9. Meanwhile, the World Vegetable Centre opens a new genebank.
10. And Türkiye hosts an international, no less, olive genebank.
11. And genebanks can be so beautiful, like works of art. Former Tate Modern director Vicente Todolí lays out his citrus samples. I wonder what he could do with olives.
12. Botanic gardens are beautiful and often act a little bit like crop genebanks. Here’s an example from Portugal I stumbled onto recently, I forget how.
13. You know what I’d like to see? An international pepper genebank, that’s what. No, not the kind that might be in those Guatemalan community seedbanks or the WorldVeg genebank. This sort of pepper. Piper pepper.
14. I bet the ancient Egyptians had pepper. Egyptian archaeologist Mennat-Allah El Dorry lays out what else they had.
15. Maybe you could lay out world history using pepper. You can definitely do so using cacao and chocolate.
16. No, not using ancient DNA, but actually…
Published on April 4, 2025