- People of Rapa Nui innovated as they collapsed.
- “Extinct” Bird Seen, Eaten. Sorry, National Geographic, but I can’t better that headline. Worthy of Fark.
- Kimchi madness.
- Coming to a protected are near you: moving species to save them from climate change. CWR, anyone?
- Shrinking the C footprint of traditional peanut processing. Via.
- 15 Evolutionary Gems: alas, nothing from crops, livestock. Surely domestication could have made it in there.
- “Bulgarian wine cellars have already announced that they will plant vines with the mysterious and newly recovered variety of grapes near the Orpheus tomb.”
- And more ancient wine, this time from Malta.
- Bioversity International wises up on dismal science, launches new economics webpages.
- Wild forest foods big hit at FAO booth at Lao and International Food Festival last weekend in Vientiane.
Nibbles: Space, Grape shapes, Genetic diversity, Diseases, Bamboo, Geographic indications, Cacao
- Sweet potatoes in space. Why?
- Oblong grapes. Why?
- Mega targets of selection. Why?
- Uganda battles cassava and banana diseases.
- Increased bamboo production will not, repeat NOT, put the panda at risk.
- Mandatory disclosure of source and origin for Genetic Resources (GR) and Traditional Knowledge (TK) unpacked. Well, kinda.
- Gates funds cacao, cashew value chain. But not conservation, it seems.
Nibbles: Cheese, Seed squared, Nutrition journal, Wild boar, Bees, Local breeds, Pest, Wild goat
- Mozzarella madness.
- Homegrown Evolutionist spreads his seed.
- There’s an International Seed Swap Day of Action? And we missed it?
- The new AJFAND is out.
- Brits belatedly bring back boars, but bumble bee buggered.
- Improving local livestock breeds in Zambia: VOA tells us how and why.
- Not armyworm after all.
- Cloning the ibex: close, but no cigar.
Nibbles: Cotton, Citrus, Fig, Permaculture, Turtles, Wine, Cacao, Fish
- Wild cotton use lands prize for boffin trio.
- Unesco to protect wild Citrus in India. And read the discussion.
- IV International Symposium on Fig.
- Permaculture: The Podcast.
- The NY Times thinks Americans should eat fewer turtles. And drink more South African wine.
- Meanwile, the WSJ gets into single-source chocolate.
- Nice map of freshwater fish diversity. But will it last? WWF has a plan.
Cacao goes sustainable, yes, but how?
The World Cocoa Foundation is offering a guide to the cocoa industry on sustainability principles that focus on equitable profit, labour standards and environmental issues.
That’s from a press release. There’s something similar on the World Cocoa Foundations’s blog. But I can’t find anywhere on the WCF website the teach-yourself-sustainable-cacao-farming document that I was foolishly expecting.
I guess we’ll have to make do with some general aims:
The sustainability initiative commits the foundation and its members to working toward three categories; profit, people and planet.
For the people category, the aim is for healthy and thriving cocoa-farming communities, where international labour standards are followed and farming practices are safe.
The planet category refers to responsible, sound environmental stewardship in cocoa-farming communities where soil and water are conserved and Integrated Pest Management to limit the use of agricultural chemicals, protecting the fragile tropical ecosystem.
And in terms of profit, the aim is to improve equitable economic returns for farmers built upon expanding entrepreneurial skills, stronger and more effective farmer associations, and more productive, profitable farming practices.
and a bunch of example projects. Not much about the importance of genetic diversity, alas.