- SGDB: A Sugarcane Germplasm Database. Cool, but only 131 accessions? One would have thought there’d be more.
- Essential Oil Composition of Bothriochloa bladhii (Retz.) S.T. Blake: An Introduction from Tropical Region of Western Ghats of India. It’s a widespread neotropical grass. There are about 200 accessions in the world’s genebanks. I wonder if this lot will end up there too.
- Conservation of agricultural biodiversity – an experience in the Chotonagpur plateau region. By the Indian Statistical Institute, Giridih. 40 horsegrams collected, among other things. Does NBPGR know? Is there a database?
- Genome Classification of Musa cultivars from Northeast India as Revealed by ITS and IRAP Markers. 36 out of 38 cultivars had been correctly identified on morphology. Relationship to the national banana collection unclear.
- Correlation and Path Coefficient Analysis of Quantitative Characters in Spine Gourd (Momordica dioica Roxb.). Now we know what to select for. 50 accessions used.
- Population structure and genetic diversity analysis of Indian and exotic rice (Oryza sativa L.) accessions using SSR markers. Microsat study of 82 Asian genotypes, including some from India, identifies a few markers of use in breeding. Wheel successfully re-invented.
- Livelihood and Revenue: Role of rattans among Mongoloid tribes and settlers of Andaman and Nicobar Islands, India. Sources of food, building materials and money (via export trade), but only if harvesting is sustainable, which it doesn’t look like it is. Need a plan, including better silviculture and rotational harvesting. Oh, and get rid of the middlemen.
- Bioprospecting, biopiracy and food security in India: The emerging sides of neoliberalism. All of the above are potential neoliberal stooges.
- Comparative karyomorphological studies of three edible locally important species of Allium from India. A chive is not a chive is not a chive. But it’s hard work to tell them apart.
- Crop diversification, crop and energy productivity under raised and sunken beds: results from a seven-year study in a high rainfall organic production system. Rotations including vegetables all round better than rice monocropping. Nothing neoliberal about that. But who does nothing but rice monocropping? I guess these guys could tell you…
Nibbles: Rice intensification, Community genebank, Biodiversity & poverty, Borlaug, Deconstructing recipes, Biofortification conference, IPCC, Kenyan agricultural changes, Collecting wild chickpeas, African peanuts, Insurance for herders, Old fields, Millet fairs & diseases, GDP and malnutrition, Yeast evolution
- From SRI to SARI. Rice has never had it so good.
- Look there’s even a guy in Orisha who grows 920 varieties.
- Biodiversity conservation and poverty reduction: Unproven. Doesn’t sound like they looked at agricultural biodiversity though.
- Contrary take on the Borlaug legacy.
- From Map Your Recipe to Compare Your Recipe. h/t Rachel Laudan.
- Follow that biofortification conference in Kigali. Maybe they’ll talk about recipes.
- Guardian Environment blogger breaks down the agricultural bits of the IPCC report for you. Lots of that going around.
- No conceivable reason for growing jatropha in Kenya. One of those times when you wonder whether anyone had predicted this would happen at the time.
- So does anyone know now whether switching from coffee to banana might be a bad idea in the long run? This is your chance.
- Wild chickpea to the rescue.
- The ups and downs of groundnut research in Africa.
- Islamic insurance for herders. Demand, meet supply.
- Celtic fields can still be seen, if you know what to look for.
- Seed fair in Senegal exchanges pearl millet. Could usefully do the same in Namibia, it looks like.
- Does economic growth help in reducing child malnutrition? It depends on whether you plot % malnutrition against GDP per capita or annual change of the first against annual change in the latter.
- The complicated story of yeast, unravelled.
Nibbles: Fiji lab, World Economic Plants, USDA garlic, Breeding conference, Borlaug Summit, Alex Morrell, Hayden Flour
- Fiji commissions tissue culture lab to get clean planting materials out to farmers.
- World Economic Plants: A Standard Reference finally out. But farmers probably knew all about them already.
- Speaking of USDA, here’s what they do to conserve garlic.
- Big conference in the UK on Breeding Plants for the Future. Seems like there’s one of these every week these days.
- Like at CIMMYT, for example, in remembrance of Dr Norman Borlaug.
- “Our germplasm – our genetic base here – is the best in the world. We dominate genetics in the industry.” I’d like to meet a seed industry guy who didn’t say that.
- Meanwhile, in Arizona: “We’re not trying to go back in time, but capturing an authentic time.” I’d like to meet this guy. And put him together with the guy above.
Nibbles: Agavins, Women in Ag, Teacup shattered, Quinoa, Rice, PGR course, Seeds for Africa, Tomato, Global cookbook, Cover crops, Sheep
- Tequila plant is possible sweetener for diabetics. Talk about a waste of raw material.
- Would you Adam and Eve it? Women do not own 2% of the land. What next for the killer factcheck?
- In related news, teacup pigs are a fraud.
- Quinoa to feed the world, in Spanish.
- The rice warrior! Isn’t that overegging the pudding just a smidgen?
- Learn about plant genetic resources and seeds at Wageningen University.
- African Agriculture Technology Foundation “to avail adequate quality seeds at the right time and affordable price”. You might think some of the folks at the AATF should avail themselves of Wageningen’s course.
- Tough, flavoursome and bug resistant. Not Richard Markham, but a tomato bred specially for the Solomon Islands he’s talking about.
- Kew’s new global kitchen cookbook narrowly avoids being crushed by bandwagon trundling by.
- Cover crops are even more valuable than previously thought shock.
- Indigenous sheep breeds even more valuable than previously thought shock.
Nibbles: Peanut history, Capsicum history, Sequencing history, Globalized rice, Sustainable salmon, Women & agriculture, Climate change & yields, Forest conservation, Bumblebee conservation
- Lots to catch up on, strap yourselves in.
- The South’s original peanut is the Carolina African runner, and it is in need of help.
- Saudi Aramco World does its usual class number, this time on chili peppers. And, in a similar vein, more than you probably want to know about Tabasco sauce.
- The evolution of DNA sequencing. In 76 slides, no less, but worth it.
- Japanese rice grown in Uruguay for U.S. hipsters. Gotta love globalization.
- Sustainable salmon at long last?
- Mind the gender gap.
- Latest modelling suggests 2% crop yield decline per decade, assuming modest 2 degree C rise in temperatures by 2050. The original paper. We are so screwed. (Well, Uruguayan rice growers and U.S. hipsters aren’t, not so much.) No, really. No, wait…
- You know, if we need supercomputers to tell us that forest corridors are good for seed dispersal, it’s no wonder we can’t stop global warming. Just kidding, I think it’s great that supercomputers get a break from climate models every once in a while. Oh, and isolated trees not entirely useless either.
- Native wild bumblebees also in trouble, not just honeybees.
- So did you miss us? Even more tomorrow to clear the decks.