- ICRISAT DG agrees with Bioversity DG. Kinda. CGIAR DGs communicating via blog. Who’d have thunk it.
- Borlaug Global Rust Initiative gives its first Gene Stewardship Award to Nepali breeders. I wonder if they work with community genebanks at all. Or what they think about them. Or even if they know they are there.
- GCARD 2 is coming, socially networked up the wazoo. Be afraid.
- Authenticating natural health products via barcoding.
- FAO discussion on making agriculture work for nutrition.
- Nice photos of wild bees.
- Not sure if we already linked to the big report on why biotechnology is not delivering drought-resistant crops.
- Meet a Breeder. Conventional, natch.
- Who moved my artisanal cheese?
- Bird diversity on intensive farms like happy Tolstoyan familes: the same everywhere.
- What’s a poor cacao farmer to do? Obey the law and make a loss, or break it in the hope of breaking even?
- Kew does the crop wild relatives thing for Plantwise, and check out that picture!
- Nature discovers perreniation as salvation of African soils; can resilieficiency be far behind?
Taro help is at hand
It was a couple of years ago that we started talking about the arrival of taro leaf blight in West Africa, and the possible role that resistant material from the Pacific might have in averting a catastrophe. Well:
On 21 August 2012, help came with the arrival of breeders’ lines from Samoa and PNG and varieties from countries in Asia.
We will be following their progress with much interest.
How much would it cost to save chocolate?
The cacao community has a global strategy out for the conservation and sustainable use of cacao genetic resources.
In order to safeguard the security of cacao diversity, on which the world depends for cocoa production now and in the future, and to ensure its accessibility and sustainable use, the Global Strategy has estimated the cost of annual recurrent management activities at 1,832,736 USD.
Doesn’t seem so much to ensure the world doesn’t run out of chocolate, now does it.
What’s wrong with this picture?
Slideshare is a great resource, but I’m always slightly worried I might be missing something. Take, for example, the presentation on the barriers to adoption by Haven D. Ley, just shared by the Borlaug Global Rust Initiative. In particular, look at the seventh slide. It includes this diagram:
No reference to genebanks? Really? But, who knows, maybe the presenter mentioned the need for an occasional influx of novel diversity, and the best source for that, in their verbal comments on the slide. Or made the point that the diagram is necessarily a simplification. Or even that this is an illustration of how NOT to do breeding. I’d be interested to know what our breeder readers think of this diagram as a representation of their trade.
Nibbles: Red List, Açaí, Edible forest, Horticulture, Heirloom seed bank, Malnutrition journal, Tea breeding, Speak!
- Can cultivated species get their own Red List? Stefano Padulosi asks the tough questions.
- Açaí: could the wonder fruit also be wonderful for forests? CIFOR asks the tough questions.
- And more: You mean you can eat that?
- Horticulture has rock stars? My turn to ask the tough questions.
- Ok, so what US county is “…a hotbed of diversified, small-scale organic, natural processed food production”? Maybe not so tough.
- Will there be a follow-up to Lancet’s 2008 series on malnutrition? That’s an easy one.
- Luigi’s mother-in-law asks: Where can I get my hands on that drought-resistant tea?
- Got any other questions? World Wide Views on Biodiversity wants to hear from you, this Saturday. (Answers too, I suppose.)