Daniel Debouck, genebank manager at CIAT in Colombia, is featured in the next issue of Bioversity’s Geneflow magazine. Daniel is a world expert on beans. And an esteemed colleague.
Nibbles: Tomatoes, Fattipuffs, Thinifers, Rice, Policy, IFAP, Small oats, Yams, Drought insurance, Siberian nomads, Cereal miscegenation, Fiji breadfruit, Introgression, Mudchute, Gordon Edgar, Coconuts, Eels, Cat worship, Biofuel breeding, Perennials
- Some heirloom tomatoes resist late blight, others not so much.
- Overweight or obese Americans at 68%, and holding steady. No epidemic, say free-thinkers.
- “No wonder kids are gaining weight.” But they aren’t, see above. (Where’s that sarc-mark when you need it?)
- Hydroelectric scheme to save Ifugao rice terraces, cut carbon emissions. W-w-w?
- Climate Change and Agrobiodiversity updates us on hot policy news. Thanks.
- IFAP updates its farmers on agricultural biodiversity. Thanks again.
- Small oats genebank evaluations make big progress with young crofters.
- Yam festivities in the Philippines.
- Psst, you want drought insurance for your camel herd? Oh, and Jeremy wants to know why this IFPRI stuff didn’t find its way into the story.
- “The ability to roam freely enables people and animals to exploit or avoid a wide range of natural and manmade habitats.” Still no cure for cancer.
- Barley helps wheat. But how, exactly? I think we should be told.
- Fiji sets up breadfruit genebank Which will hopefully help local agricultural entrepreneurs.
- Anastasia on introgression. At length.
- The biggest urban farm in Europe.
- A bite of Cheese(monger).
- Coconuts bad for birds bad for soil bad for plants bad for crabs. Ok then, let’s cut the damn things down, shall we?
- Cockney cuisine takes a turn for the worse. Well would you Adam and Eve it?
- Egyptian cat temple pix. Miaow.
- “…the first biofuel crop breeding programs for low-input systems are likely to accelerate progress by focusing on grass–legume bicultures.”
- And another from the Land Institute: “…harvested perennial
grasslands provide valuable ecological benchmarks for agricultural sustainability.”
Helping Haiti
Difficult to say anything new about what’s going on in Haiti. It is all sad beyond belief. WWF is rightly encouraging people to give. Seconded. UNEP has announced an environmental recovery effort. There’s no shortage of advice on what must be done. FAO is trying to raise money to support food production in fields and homegardens. The planting season starts in March, so time is short. Meanwhile, CABI’s blog looked at the underlying food security problems.
I haven’t come across any information on what’s happened to the Centre de Recherche et de Documentation Agricole (MARNDR), but I don’t hold out much hope. It housed the national germplasm collection of 513 beans and 54 maize accessions. SINGER lists 233 accessions from Haiti, almost all rice (48), beans (113) and maize (67). GRIN lists 111 (almost all rice, maize, cotton, beans). 1 At first sight it seems that maybe most of the stuff that is in MARNDR should be findable elsewhere, though that’s quite a lot of beans.
LATER: IFPRI DG has his say too.
Hari honoured
Dr Hari D Upadhyaya, head of the ICRISAT genebank, has just been honoured as a Fellow of the Crop Science Society of America (CSSA). Hari has done a huge amount of work on the theory and practice of core collections, among other things. Congratulations, Hari. Richly deserved.
Nibbles: Cyanide, Pollinators, Artemisia, AnGR
- More carbon dioxide means more cyanide in cassava, relative to protein. Will the good news never end?
- Pollinators like diversity too.
- Another day, another genome.
- FAO surveys livestock conservation community “to evaluate the current status of existing national and multicountry conservation arrangements and reveal the possibilities for regional collaboration in the future.”