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January 25, 2009January 26, 2009

Dirt goes to Hollywood

The cinephiles among us will know that the Sundance Film Festival is on at the moment. Well, agrobiodiversity-philes everywhere will rejoice that one of the movies being screened is a documentary called Dirt! The Movie. It is, of course, about soil. Is the lady in the photo in that last link Vandana Shiva? She does feature in the cast list, along with other agrobiodiversity luminaries. Anyway, perhaps surprisingly, the flick seems to be eliciting some interest among mainstream Hollywood critics. Has anyone out there seen it? It’s based on the book Dirt: The Ecstatic Skin of the Earth by William Bryant Logan.

LATER: Alas, “Dirt” is not mentioned by The Economist as a possible next eco-blockbuster, but Robert will be pleased at the plug for “The End of the Line.”

January 24, 2009January 23, 2009

Vienna stressfest

I know it’s a long shot, but are any of our readers going to the conference on Plant Abiotic Stress Tolerance next month in Vienna? It seems to be mainly about Arabidopsis, but the final session on breeding might just hold some agrobiodiversity interest, and if so we’d love to know about it.

January 23, 2009January 23, 2009

Nibbles: Peanut butter, Slow Food, Pacific, School, Carnations

“The legume that giveth can also taketh away.”
Content Coordinator at Slow Food Nation asks: “Am I a coniglio?“
Tracing Pacific migrations through stomach bugs.
Rethinking school lunch.
â€œThere is still a stigma to the flower.â€ Er, yes, and your point is?

January 23, 2009January 23, 2009

Fowl play

The Rai3 TV programme Geo&Geo had a great little piece last night on AIRPA, which stands for Allevatrici Italiane Razze Pregiate Avicole. That translates as Italian Rearers of Esteemed Breeds of Fowl. But the word for “rearers” is in the feminine form, which means the society is open to women only. The rationale for this is as follows, according to the website: “le donne cercano di vedere le cose dal punto di vista dell’animale, applicano un allevamento compassionevole, solidarietÃ , maggiore delicatezza.” That is, women try to see things more from the point of view of the animal, and are more compassionate and delicate towards them. That was certainly obvious from the interviews in the programme. Anyway, if you’re interested in a list of fowl breeds in Italy, here it is.

January 22, 2009January 22, 2009

Leisa blogs!

E-LEISA is a quarterly newsletter that carries highlights from the global edition of LEISA Magazine and keeps you in touch with the LEISA Network.

And very interesting it is too: we’ve linked to it in the past. Well, LEISA now also has a blog. Been going a couple of months, and they have linked to us, and left us a nice comment, so we’ll repay the compliment.

A post from a few days ago discusses the importance of photographs “in communicating innovations and best practices in agricultural development.” We blogged a couple of days ago about how photos can be used to identify agrobiodiversity. ((Though some people also get it wrong.)) It turns out “DFID’s Research Into Use Programme (RIU) has published a Field Guide to Photography, produced by SCRIPTORIA Communications.” Looks excellent.