Category: Fruits and nuts

Posted on

BBC World to screen biodiversity documentary

People with access to BBC World TV channel, stand by for a treat. Tomorrow night (i.e. Friday 15 February 2008) at 20.30 GMT you can watch Forbidden Fruit, latest in the Earth Report series produced by Television Trust for the Environment. The programme follows two somewhat different scientists. Stefano Padulosi, of Bioversity International, works with colleagues from the M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation in India to reinvigorate millets for nutrition and income. Isabella dalla Ragione runs Archeologi Arborea, an Italian organization dedicated to rediscovering, conserving and distributing long-lost varieties of fruit.

https://agro.biodiver.se/wp-content/uploads/2008/02/fruittve.mov

Above (if the technology works) you should be able to see a clip from the film. (If not, consider going to the Earth Report page at TVE, and accept my apologies. Consider, too, getting a decent web browser.)

Posted on

Carse of Gowrie gung-ho for old orchards

The Perthshire Advertiser reports on efforts in that neck of the woods to preserve and revitalize old orchards and the varieties they contain. I didn’t know this, but the Carse of Gowrie (which sounds like an ancient honorific title but is, in fact, a stretch of land north of Edinburgh on the north side of the Firth of Tay) is an ancient centre of fruit-growing in Scotland. A joint effort by local authorities and others has conducted a survey and is examining ways of making more of the remaining old orchards — 28 of 51 have already been lost — and their trees. There’s a meeting on 30th January. If anyone there is reading this, we’d love to know more.

Posted on

Apples unmoved

One of the bits of news we missed while we were resting and relaxing as hard as we were: the UK’s collection of apples and other fruits is staying at Brogdale. This may strike you as no-news news. It isn’t.

Long-standing readers will remember that the UK government put management of the site out to tender, and that two of the proposals required moving the entire collection to a new site. This seemed like a slightly daft idea, at least from our perspective. So it is good to relate that the management contract was awarded to Reading University, who will be leaving the collection where it is.

The Visitor Centre and sales areas are being expanded, and it could be that the collection is now poised to play a more important role in spreading the good news about all those fruit varieties that aren’t available in little plastic bags in the supermarket.

It has been a long and complex struggle, and it is not clear what the future of the Brogdale Horticultural Trust. We’ll try and keep informed.