- Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services documents examples of how indigenous people’s knowledge conserves biodiversity, including of the agricultural kind.
- The truth about frankincense and myrrh. Talk about traditional knowledge.
- Can global crop production meet future demands? The Story Map.
- What ICRISAT is doing about the above, from the horse’s mouth.
- Progress in Achieving and Delivering Drought Tolerance in Maize — An Update: “Germplasm collections are assuming greater importance if gains from native genes are to be sustained. Efficient and accurate field phenotyping remains essential for genetic progress.”
- Workshop in Field-based High Throughput Phenotyping. Next April, in Arizona, you maize people.
- A clone is a clone is… no wait.
- Root and tuber people already planning their next big shindig, in October 2015. Meanwhile, they’re getting down to work in the Pacific.
- AoB Blog on plant science on Facebook. Also on Facebook.
- Solanum expert Dr Sandy Knapp on the of Global Plants Initiative.
- Archaeological remains of agriculture found in Nuevo Leon are oldest for that Mexican state.
- Legumes (genera) of the world now online, thanks to Kew.
Brainfood: Asian American horticulture, Salt resistant Vigna, Rubber dandelion, Biofortifying wheat, US apple cores, Central European barley, Swedish peas, Alpine dairy, CAP crap, MVP
- Asian Germplasm in American Horticulture: New Thoughts on an Old Theme. The tap has sort of run dry.
- Identification of salt resistant wild relatives of mungbean (Vigna radiata (L.) Wilczek). From 22 accessions of 7 species to 2 accessions of 2 species. Now for the hard part.
- Available germplasm of the potential rubber crop belongs to a poor rubber producer, (Compositae–Crepidinae).
Cultivation of the Russian dandelion (Taraxacum koksaghyz) was no such thing, but taxonomy has the answer. - Biofortification strategies to increase grain zinc and iron concentrations in wheat. Not just about the breeding.
- Diversity Captured in the USDA-ARS National Plant Germplasm System Apple Core Collection. Apple core? Seriously.
- Genes for resistance to powdery mildew in European winter barley cultivars registered in the Czech Republic and Slovakia to 2010. There’s quite a few of them, some of them previously unknown. Oh those jammy breeders. And beer drinkers.
- Genetic diversity in local cultivars of garden pea (Pisum sativum L.) conserved ‘on farm’ and in historical collections. Little connection between historical and current material, and genetic erosion both in genebanks and on farms.
- Dairy systems in mountainous areas: Farm animal biodiversity, milk production and destination, and land use. The traditional, low-input systems are best for sustainability and biodiversity, but have low productivity, but geographic appellations for cheeses can make up for that.
- The contribution of the EU Common Agricultural Policy to protecting biodiversity and global climate in Europe. Is, ahem, limited.
- Can Big Push Interventions Take Small-Scale Farmers out of Poverty? Insights from the Sauri Millennium Village in Kenya. Greater productivity (due to seeds and fertilizers) compared to nearby villages does not translate into higher incomes. Well that’s awkward.
Nibbles: Dog fight, Deforestation maps, CWR maps, Food fight, Limpopo, Maize uses, CC adaptation breeding, Global Tree Campaign, Intensification & deforestation, American ginseng, Fish & crop yields, Fish oils, Perennially watching annual grains
- A third take on dog origins. Lock them all up in a small room and don’t let them out until they figure out a way to solve this. And more.
- Great new maps of deforestation. Same as the old maps? I’m confused.
- Ah, to be able to mash them up with crop wild relatives gap-maps! Or others, for that matter…
- Clear, balanced take on how to fix the food system. (And a great potted summary of why it is necessary to do so by the sainted Lawrence Haddad. The interviewer is not bad either.) Except maybe for the bit which sort of implies that the only way to improve crops is via GM. And for the other side…
- Bioversity comes up with a strategy for community seed banks in Limpopo and other areas of South Africa. Coincidentally, another CGIAR report on the same region, looking at wider food security issues. I wonder if the two could/should be mashed up? But really my main reason for linking to the second thing is to see how many people read the title as a plea for a return to old-fashioned cartography, as I did.
- Dual-purpose maize, shmaize. I just love that building.
- Latin American consortium looking for potatoes and wheat varieties adapted to new climatic conditions. Amazing that it is news, in a way.
- Global Tree Campaign launches new website. Sill no RSS feed though, that I can see. LATER: Here’s the feed, sorry to the GTC!
- Speaking of trees… Will agricultural intensification save tropical forests? Well, maybe. Demand elasticity comes into it, apparently. Dismal science indeed. I suppose those maps above come in useful for this kind of thing?
- In other news, the Middle Tennessee State University has a ginseng initiative.
- Teach a woman to aquaculture, improve her crop yields. No wait: Fish? We don’t need no stinking fish.
- 10 Ancient Grains to Watch. The usual suspects. This was pretty boring even when it was news.
Nibbles: Soil testing kit, Sustainable farming, Coffee and climate change, BGI genebank, Bamboo genebank, Genebank management, India’s malnutrition, Phenotyping conference, CIP genebank video, CG impact, Feed the World
Luigi went on a three-week trip, and all he came back with was this:
- A new soil testing kit? Really?
- Ok, how about a SciDev Spotlight featurette on sustainable farming? No? Well, can I tempt you with the British Ecological Society on agroecology then?
- Oh, I bet this thing on coffee and climate change will hit home.
- I’m pretty sure news of yet another Chinese genebank (of sorts) won’t.
- Pssst. Got room for a new bamboo genebank too?
- They’ll need a genebank management system, won’t they? GRIN and bear it.
- News too of hunger and malnutrition in India, by Indians, for … er …
- Phenotyping conference, anyone? Anyone at all? Some EU breeders will no doubt be there. And some of them at least will find a new map of water risk useful in their work.
- And to end with, Al Jazeera on the CIP potato genebank. You heard me.
- As you were, there’s the CGIAR Knowledge Day too, all about delivery and impact. I wonder if the genebanks will feature…
- Not so fast, there’s also a live webcast of the conference Feeding the World without Consuming the Planet that awaits you.
Nibbles: Gardeners meet, Aussie wheat breeding, Sunflower Man, Crop phenology, AEGIS on rye, AVRDC birthday, Long tail, CWR talks
- 5th Global Botanic Gardens Congress coming up in Dunedin, New Zealand. Isn’t that somewhere near the Shire? And one garden’s engagement with agricultural biodiversity.
- “It’s 2050, and Australia’s bounteous wheat harvest has been saved.” You see, as a total amateur at this lark, I’d have started with that.
- Loren Rieseberg, interviewed.
- HarvestChoice using fancy remote sensing imagery to improve crop calendars, give themselves excuse to quote Byrds classic.
- European rye collection a little closer to reality.
- WorldVeg turns 40.
- Bellon and Ntandou-Bouzitou explore the tail. Talk about local innovation…
- Old friends talk about crop wild relatives.