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.
Feria del Elote
From CIMMYT’s Flickr feed:
Carts selling tacos made with maize tortillas (traditional Mexican flatbreads) in Jala, Nayarit, on the Pacific coast of Mexico, during the town’s annual two-week Feria del Elote, or maize ear festival. Tortillas are a staple food in Mexico, and are commonly filled to make tacos. For more about maize in Jala, see CIMMYT’s August 2007 e-news story “Pride and pragmatism sustain a giant Mexican maize,” available online.
Photo credit: Eloise Phipps/CIMMYT.
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.
Nibbles: Climate change, Guinea pigs, Eels, Seed
- Community local knowledge confirms scientific findings on climate change. (Or vice versa?)
- A CIAT video on “the potential of particular forage crops for improving guinea pig production, improving rural nutrition and incomes, and empowering women” in DRC.
- Sustainable eel label. Like that’ll help. h/t The Tracing Paper.
- The small scale farmer who is also Director of Communications and Public Affairs for AGRA runs into a seed shortage. So she plants an unsuitable maize variety and hopes for the best.
The Pahiyas festival
“Pahiyas is a Filipino term that means precious offering and predates the Spanish colonial period of the country by several centuries. This celebration was originally an animistic ritual practiced by the pre-Christian Filipinos to honor their rice god, Ampo’t Paray, and to ask for bountiful harvests in the coming year.”