- Fruit and veg make people happier shock.
- Grazing sheep on fallow makes soils better (but not as good as ploughing).
- Zambian cashew nut farmers make plans for the future.
- US sugar support policies make no sense whatsoever.
Brainfood: Perennial wheat, Tree diversity, Fire, Dog domestication, Coffee diversity, Uganda cassava diversity, Sorghum structure, Japanese pastures, Maize diversity, Protection, Pigeonpea hybrid, Wheat nutritional composition, Pollinator diversity, Cajanus gap, Tree diversity, Resilient seed systems
- Perennial cereal crops: An initial evaluation of wheat derivatives. Early days still.
- Effects of silviculture on native tree species richness: interactions between management, landscape context and regional climate. Encourage mosaics, and don’t harvest everything.
- The global fire–productivity relationship. It’s humped, and will be changed by climate change, though for different reasons for different productivity levels. Wonder about the fire-diversity relationship, though.
- Ancient DNA Analysis Affirms the Canid from Altai as a Primitive Dog. Bit of a judgement call though.
- Genetic structure and diversity of coffee (Coffea) across Africa and the Indian Ocean islands revealed using microsatellites. Just what you would expect, given the “morpho-taxonomic species delimitations and genetic units.”
- Genetic diversity among farmer-preferred cassava landraces in Uganda. Landraces only a bit more diverse than elites overall, but half of them quite different.
- Correspondence between genetic structure and farmers’ taxonomy — a case study from dry-season sorghum landraces in northern Cameroon. Genetic units = farmer-recognized landraces.
- Plant diversity, productivity and nutritive value change following abandonment of public pastures in Japan. The best way to restore productivity (diversity doesn’t change much) in abandoned pastures is to start grazing them again.
- Genetic variability of maize stover quality and the potential for genetic improvement of fodder value. You can improve stover and grain yield simultaneously, in hybrids. In theory.
- Governance regime and location influence avoided deforestation success of protected areas in the Brazilian Amazon. Total protection better than sustainable use. Ouch. Meanwhile, in the USA…
- ICPH 2671 – the world’s first commercial food legume hybrid. Yet another milestone on the road to the complete eradication of farmers’ rights.
- Genetic improvement of grain protein content and other health-related constituents of wheat grain. Need to figure out the genetic control mechanisms, and then exploit “alien” germplasm using MAS. Oh, and GMOs too.
- Quantifying the impacts of bioenergy crops on pollinating insect abundance and diversity: a field-scale evaluation reveals taxon-specific responses. Diversity begets diversity.
- Diversity and geographical gaps in Cajanus scarabaeoides (L.) Thou. germplasm conserved at the ICRISAT genebank. Now collectors know exactly where to go.
- Tree species diversity increases fine root productivity through increased soil volume filling. Below-ground complementarity is good for everyone’s roots, presumably good for the community too.
- Making seed systems more resilient to stress. Foster informal innovation, but also information exchange (presumably including of the formal kind).
Nibbles: Phenomics, Genomes, Indian cucurbits, Argania, Food in history, Sourghum & drought, USDA genebanks, Queenly pear, CIMMYT genebank, Malawi cowpea, Nutrition strategy
- Phenomics is the new genomics.
- No, wait. Peanuts to get a genome. A rice relative’s got one already.
- All the Cucurbitaceae of India, in one handy checklist.
- The paradox of argan oil.
- Couple of things on the history of food. And one on the ethics of food.
- Big push for drought-resistant sorghum. Wait, I thought it was drought-resistant already.
- Ft Collins gets yet another media write-up.
- Telegraph says Queen gets rare pear. Letter writer to Times begs to differ on the whole rarity thing. It sounds like, damn thing being (mostly) behind a paywall.
- If you’re on Facebook, why not like this photo of the CIMMYT maize genebank?
- Canada to help Malawi diversify. Into cowpeas.
- Big report on big nutrition meeting. Big deal?
Nibbles: Quinoazzzzz, Haiti seed bank, Guatemala seed bank, Seed systems, Hybrid wheat, OFSP, Fish characterization, Vanilla
- This quinoa thing is getting tedious.
- Clinton brings a seed bank to Haiti, “which will support efforts to increase agricultural production.” Will be interesting to see how exactly it does that.
- Whereas this seed bank in Guatemala “is empowering the local community to preserve and grow the seeds.” So there you go.
- Of course, those seed banks are going to need seed systems. And vice versa.
- And the next milestone in the continuing disempowering of the farmer is…
- Orange-fleshed sweet potatoes go aquatic. Where they’ll find fish that need to be compared.
- A Tongan vanilla tour.
Nibbles: Epigenetics, Cacao strategy, B4FN book, Seed systems book, Nutrition conference, Brit Brassica boffins bonanza
- Geographic patterns in epigenomic variation. Yeah, but in Arabidopsis.
- A global strategy for conservation. Yeah, but for cacao.
- That “Diversifying Food and Diets — Using Agricultural Biodiversity to Improve Nutrition and Health” book? You’ll be able to get chapters and case studies from a dedicated website nine months after publication.
- Not to be outdone, the Ethiopian Institute of Agriculture Research lets you download “Defining Moments in the Ethiopian Seed System.”
- New Agriculturist fillets out some contributions to a recent Economist conference on malnutrition.
- The Brassica research community gets together in the UK. Not many people hurt.