- Friday was International Day of the World’s Indigenous People. Let one post on Indigenous Peoples and the Diversity of Food represent them all. (But isn’t that coffee in the photo?)
- And yesterday was 23 Thermidor, AKA Lentil Day, in the French Republican Calendar. In other news, “Every day of the French Republican Calendar was associated with a different plant, animal, agricultural tool, etc., both to replace the custom of saints’ days and to celebrate the agricultural and natural world.”
- Today brings notice of a contest to “showcase projects from around the globe that have bridged gaps between agriculture, food security, and nutrition”. Details from Secure Nutrition.
- Growing greens — even exotic kale — in Kibera, Nairobi, would surely be a worthy winner.
- Not so sure about the photo story of Combat farming in Afghanistan, (via Metafilter) which seems to be oblivious to the number one cash crop in those parts.
Nibbles: Sustainability, Decaffeinated coffee, Salep orchids, Conference, Negroamaro
- The Sustainable Development Solutions Initiative wants your comments on its report Solutions for Sustainable Agriculture and Food Systems. You have till 15 August. h/t ILRI.
- We can do you natural decaf, if you’re willing to risk losing the entire coffee crop to drought or insects.
- Likewise, we can do you Turkish ice-cream, but you may have to do without some orchids in future.
- I don’t suppose the January 2014 meeting on “Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture in a Changing Climate” being organised by NordGen will be able to help, but it might.
- I confess, I have found myself sipping a Negroamaro and wondering how it got that name.
Too hot to think
It is hot in Rome at the moment, and hotter still at my desk. In fact, my computer gave up the ghost on Friday and had to have a brain transplant. All back to normal, for now, but not a lot to report, apart from trying to maintain a steady stream of Nibbles. A couple that didn’t fit there. First, the picture: an undoctored image of two consecutive items from my Twitter stream that just happened to take my fancy. Secondly, a trial of pickling cucumber varieties that didn’t even mention asier (about which I too knew nothing until 4 days ago). That post is about a year old, but someone else linked to it in the past couple of days. And, if you’re thinking of something to do with excess cucumbers, and you fancy a touch of the exotic, how about creating a pressure-infused cucumber martini? Sounds like a blast. Cheers!
Nibbles: Feed lots, Tom Wagner, Ag Game, Cereal maps, Climate change, All change, Bananas extinct?, Permaculture course, Criminal urban ag, IPRs and GMOs
- Feed lots, from the ever-wonderful Nicola Twilley – is the first of our eye-openers.
- Bifurcated carrots is hosting a PDF profile of Tom Wagner, prolific breeder of tomatoes and potatoes.
- Katherine McDonald is keen on a farming simulator game. Games? Who has time? Maybe this weekend.
- 1969 maps of cereals in India. I’d love to see them updated. A project for …
- … Jacob van Etten. He and Emile Frison say that “Harnessing Diversity by Connecting People is the Key to Climate Adaptation in Agriculture”.
- On Dr Frison’s last day as DG of Bioversity International. So, farewell then …
- … the banana. Pat Heslop-Harrison consulted by BBC’s The Food Programme. Here’s his take on Bananas and their future.
- Cornell University is offering an online course in permaculture design.
- Wouldn’t it be cool if the city planners in Los Angeles decriminalized urban agriculture?
- Grist gets to grips with the locks that imprison GMO research – real and imaginary.
Nibbles: Hunger, Breeds, Jatropha, Value chains, Vegetables, Temperature, Quinoa
- The Lancet waxes optimistic on hunger and poverty goals.
- Korea keen to help compile information on African livestock.
- Is there nothing Jatropha cannot do? Now it’s a carbon sink.
- Fijian ginger and Ethiopian beans; two value chains explored in the latest New Agriculturalist.
- An International Symposium on Vegetables in August 2014, with lots of interest, but as it is under the ISHS you’ll have to pay to read about it.
- “Temperature alters population dynamics of common plant pests.” Ya don’t say.
- “Help a Bolivian farmer: Eat quinoa“. Now there’s a headline with attitude.