There’s a great set of pictures of Kenyan traditional crops and food preparation on UNESCO’s Facebook page, in their Documenting Living Heritage series. This is part of an exhibition currently on at UNESCO’s HQ in Paris to raise awareness of the 2003 Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage. I doubt there’s a photograph of the Gene Bank of Kenya, but that surely contributes to that goal too.
Nibbles: Maori, Göbekli Tepe, Spinacia, Herbarium
- Ancient Maoris traded kiwi feathers. What’s that you say? Kiwis are not agrobiodiversity? Says who?
- Did organized religion come before agriculture? It’s a toss-up, frankly.
- Looking for wild spinach. Ah, to be in the field again!
- How to use a plant press. With video goodness. Ah, to be in the field again! Ok, settle down now, back to the grind.
German lentils go back home
Before the introduction of the potato, Irish people included grain as a dietary mainstay, particularly oats. Oats were used in breads, desserts, drinks, medicines and cosmetics! Other grains that were grown included barley, flax, rye and some wheats. Unfortunately, many of these grain varieties were lost and we had to turn, primarily to the Vavilov Institute in Russia, the first genebank in the world, to repatriate our native grains. Michael Miklis in Piltown, Kilkenny, working with very small quantities of grain, over many years trialed them and bulked them up so that they could be resown on field scale again.
That reference to the Vavilov Institute on the Irish Seed Savers website reminded me of something similar they told me about the last time I was there.
Dr Margarita Vishnyaova, the head of the legume department, told me that they had recently “repatriated” some “German” lentils to a farmer cooperative in Baden-Wuerttemberg. The varieties in question are labelled “Späts Alpenlinse” (K2106, collected Hungary in 1965) and “Späths Albinse” (K2076, collected Czechoslovakia in 1963) in VIR’s records. Woldemar Mammel, a farmer from near Stuttgart had apparently been looking for these varieties in databases all over the place and eventually happened on them in the VIR online catalogue. They are old traditional varieties from the Swabian Alps which are no longer grown in Germany, or at least his part of them. The handover of the seed to Herr Mammel and a group of 15 other German organic farmers took place in Nov. 2007 at VIR, and was filmed by Slow Food Deutschland (Prof. Dr Roman Lenz, Dinah Epperlein). There are some photographs of the event on the Slow Food website. Sometimes genebank databases are good for something after all.
Vegetable seed kits for Thailand; more details
We are very pleased that the World Vegetable Center has responded to our concerns about the vegetable seed kits that the Center has been distributing in the wake of the floods in Thailand. Thanks to Maureen Mecozzi for this contribution.
We appreciate and share your concern regarding seed distribution in the wake of disasters. To clarify the role of AVRDC–The World Vegetable Center in providing seed to Thailand:
The floods in Thailand affected agricultural areas, and the military is facilitating the relief operations on behalf of the Royal Project. The Project’s patron, Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn, requested seed from the Ministry of Agriculture, which was unable to supply as much as was needed. Kasetsart University will launch an overall development program that will include home gardens, but it also lacked seed in sufficient quantities for distribution.
KU and the ministry approached AVRDC–The World Vegetable Center to help supply seed for these initiatives.
AVRDC’s disaster relief seed kits include hardy, fast-growing vegetable varieties with low input requirements that can provide much-needed nutrition to disaster survivors. Crops in AVRDC’s disaster relief kits are carefully selected to suit local agroecologies and food preferences. The kits include cultivation and food preparation instructions in local languages.
Each kit provides enough seed for one household to grow vegetables on 100 m2 of land to provide a balanced supply of protein and micronutrients during the initial months after a disaster.
Please note:
- Seed for the disaster relief kits was produced in Thailand.
- Crops selected for the kits are locally adapted, open-pollinated varieties (farmers can save their own seed to plant in following seasons).
- The crops are well-known in Thailand and palatable to Thai tastes and preferences.
- The crops are nutritious and quick-growing.
- Seed was properly pre-treated and stored to ensure high germination rates.
The Center’s disaster seed kits are not designed to supplant the local seed supply system. Food production systems can be severely disrupted or destroyed altogether in the wake of a disaster; supplying seed kits helps survivors in agricultural areas bridge the gap until local seed systems recover.
Brainfood: Introgression, Sorghum and drought, Rice and drought, Carrot evaluation, Wheat breeding, Legume conservation, Wild Tibet soybean, Gezira, Biochar, CA, Grass ecotypes and climate, Organic ag and nutrients
- Alien introgressions represent a rich source of genes for crop improvement. Polyploids such as wheat do it best.
- Characterization of sorghum genotypes for traits related to drought tolerance. There is diversity within the “association panel” of diverse germplasm used. What I want to know is how that is different from a core or mini-core collection.
- Rice near-isogenic-lines (NILs) contrasting for grain yield under lowland drought stress. Small genetic differences can lead to big differences in yield under drought stress. What I want to know is whether doing this on NILs is better value for money than doing it on association panels of germplasm (see above), whatever they may be.
- Towards better tasting and more nutritious carrots: Carotenoid and sugar content variation in carrot genetic resources. European accessions sweeter and more orange than Asian.
- Changes in duration of developmental phases of durum wheat caused by breeding in Spain and Italy during the 20th century and its impact on yield. Fascinating unpicking of just where the genetic changes have their impact.
- Legume genetic resources: management, diversity assessment, and utilization in crop improvement. A lot of characterization, not enough evaluation. Core collections useful, but not useful enough. Crop wild relatives being used, but not enough. Good plug for the importance of geo-referencing.
- Genetic diversity and geographical peculiarity of Tibetan wild soybean (Glycine soja). Low and high, respectively.
- Analysis of agricultural production instability in the Gezira Scheme. Went up for wheat, cotton and sorghum, down for groundnuts, on liberalization.
- Biochar effects on soil biota – A review. It’s complicated but, on the whole, not unpositive.
- A research agenda to explore the role of conservation agriculture in African smallholder farming systems. Basically, it is likely to work least well in marginal conditions. Which is kinda surprising, and not, at the same time.
- Ecotypes of European grass species respond differently to warming and extreme drought. Yeah, but, alas, not in the way one might have wished.
- Comparison of nutritional quality of the crops grown in an organic and conventional fertilized soil. Maybe lower nitrate and N, higher P in organic crops. But really too much variation to be sure.