Category: Genebanks

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Day 1 at the Amman drylands conference

The international conference on Food Security and Climate Change in Dry Areas got off to a stirring start with a long, passionate and scientifically very literate speech from the guest of honour, HRH Prince El Hassan Bin Talal. That was followed by keynotes from Drs Mahendra Shah and Mahmoud Solh, who have a huge amount of experience at the highest level of agricultural research and strategic planning in this region and beyond. Now, I did tweet some key points from their talks via my mobile, but as I write this over lunch they haven’t turned up in our stream yet. For all I know, they never will. Wifi access in the conference room is problematic, so you may have to be satisfied with these occasional summaries.

Anyway, here are some selected soundbites — the agrobiodiversity themed ones, mainly — from the morning session, including the Q&A:

  • We will need to trade an extra 500 million tons of cereals by 2080.
  • 175 million extra people (over the 1 billion hungry today) will go hungry due to climate change by 2080. Remember we were supposed to cut that figure by half.
  • In the dry areas, production increases will need to come almost exclusively from yield improvement. 90% of potentially new arable land is in only 7 countries!
  • Genebanks are key to the intensification that will be required if agriculture is to adapt.
  • Synthetic wheats, winter sowing of chickpea, IPM of Sunn pest are some of the success stories of crop diversity use for adaptation.
  • ICARDA has identified those small ruminant local breeds which are expected to be most adaptable to climate change. What about the poor others, though?
  • Both “protected agriculture” (greenhouses, hydroponics etc.) and conservation agriculture have a role to play in adaptation (and possibly mitigation too).
  • Why are we closing down agricultural extension services around the world?
  • Global models for the effects of climate change are fine, but downsizing to community level is often problematic, and THAT is where adaptation occurs. Or doesn’t.
  • What can we learn from how local people manage the oasis ecosystem?
  • Governance is a problem, sure, but let’s not hide behind the failings of politicians in assessing why science and technology innovations haven’t worked.
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    Abu Ghraib genebank rises from the ashes, thanks to Sanaa

    Meet Mrs Sanaa Abdul Wahab Al-Sheikh. She used to work at the old Iraqi national genebank at Abu Ghraib. That genebank was looted and destroyed in the aftermath of the invasion. But Mrs Sanaa says she saved about a thousand accessions by hiding them underground and in her fridge. She now works at the new, rebuilt Iraqi national genebank at Abu Ghraib, under the State Board for Seed Testing and Certification. And the accessions she saved from the old collection have been joined by hundreds of others that she’s been collecting from farmers’ fields since 2004. A remarkable person.

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    Nibbles: Spud, Mali’s farmers, Pollan, Geneflow, Taiwan botanic garden, Pollinators squared, Vegetarianism

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    César Gómez Campo RIP

    Prof. César Gómez Campo died in Madrid on September 5 last year. I’m sorry we didn’t note this earlier.

    In 1966 César established the ‘‘Banco de Semillas de la Escuela Técnica Superior de Ingenieros Agrónomos de Madrid’’ (Seed Bank of the Higher Technical School of Agronomists of Madrid, in short: UPM Seed Bank), the first example ever of gene bank devoted to the conservation of wild species seeds. In César’s idea the long term ex situ conservation of wild taxa was a form of conservation of species endangered of extinction complementary to botanical gardens. In fact, his mind conceived this idea in a very modern way, that is including concepts of the genetic variation, in times when the concepts of nature conservation were at their very beginning.

    That’s from the obituary at Genetic Resources and Crop Evolution, which is unfortunately behind a paywall except for the first page; everyone can, however, access Gómez Campo’s “essential” bibliography. He’s been described as a pioneer of the conservation of the Spanish flora, especially crop wild relatives, and that is true. But his work on ex situ conservation had an impact far beyond the Iberian peninsula.

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    Nibbles: City fish, Phylogenetics course, Andy got a brand new blog, Leather value-adding, Cod, Monastery gardens, Microbial collections, Cassava, Animal genebank, Biofuel