- Svalbard among things being discussed at EATx Cali today. Who knows, maybe other genebanks too?
- The cucumber’s wilder relatives.
- Armenian wine going back to the future.
- Whole grains deconstructed.
- Unpicking domestication in chickens and cattle. And the original paper on the latter, featuring the aurochs genome.
- Breeders have bred omega-3 alpha-linolenic acid (ALA) out of soybeans, but are now going back to wild relatives to breed it back in.
A periplus to the geography of food
This Article Selection has been created in order to highlight some of the huge body of research on the topic of Food across Geography, Planning and Development journals. In recent years, we have published an increasing number of articles on this topic, from a very wide range of perspectives, and interest continues to grow today.
Great idea from Elsevier.
Nibbles: Kiwi breeding, Nagoya Protocol, ITPGRFA, Hablitzia, Eating insects, Patents, European forests, Native American foodways, Plant protein, Broken bread, Apples, Dog cartoon, Climate change & yields, Seed pix
- Building a better Hayward kiwi.
- Adapting to Nagoya.
- But if the Treaty works, maybe you wont need to. And that includes farmers’ rights, of course.
- The Caucasian Spinach is a new one on me, but I’d try it.
- Eating insects is safe. But I suspect that was never the issue.
- What have patents ever done for us?
- Europe’s forests are in a state. See what I did there?
- Yes, it’s time for this year’s seasonal “wild rice” story.
- The non-meat future of protein.
- Does bread even have a future?
- Well, how would you describe an apple? Maybe by use? In the meantime, Tom “The Appleman” Adams is taking the next step.
- Dog domestication explained.
- Nice map of what climate change will do to crops. Spoiler alert: it’s not good.
- The beauty of seeds.
Nibbles: Nepal earthquake, Vavilov visit, Conservation strategies, Insects & markets, Hydrid breeding, Women & agrobiodiversity, Indian minor crops, Wes Jackson, Drought tolerance, Wheat shindig, Industry support
- Getting the right seeds to Nepali farmers.
- An organic farmer visits the Vavilov Institute.
- Conservation: beyond hotspots, beyond markets.
- Letting the market deal with insect foods.
- Hybrids 101.
- Tamil Nadu women millet farmers show us all how it’s done. In Milan.
- Climate change? Let them eat rice bean.
- End of an era at the Land Institute.
- And the biggest environmental footprint goes to…lamb.
- Drought tolerance: a geneticist explains.
- International wheat meeting in the news.
- How does the European seed industry support crop diversity conservation and use? Let me map that for you.
Preserving the canon of taste
Fascinating article in Aeon magazine by Jill Neimark, exploring the role of specific, older varieties in the experience of taste. I won’t steal her thunder here, just urge you to read it. I will, however, cavil at one statement:
All commercial apples, including Granny Smiths, have been hybridised to a sugary monotone.
That’s simply not true, unless hybridised means something else in Georgia.
If they’re called Granny Smith, their genetics should be the same. If they taste dreadful from the supermarket, and astonishing picked up from a roadside stand “by a white-frame house on a curving, shady lane by Lake Allatoona,” that’s the result of nurture, not nature.
But please ignore my quibbles — and I have others — unless you agree that sometimes accuracy matters.