Nibbles: Desert garden, Funding, Vegetables, Communication, Ecosystem services, Bees, Native grasses, Soil, Raspberries, Ancient ag trade, Soybeans, Ag origins

Agricultural economist put on the spot

Over at the Freakonomics Blog, there’s a Q&A with an eminent agricultural economist, Daniel Sumner of Davis. A timely idea, and some of the questions are actually pretty good, with a few even concerning agrobiodiversity, albeit obliquely. Problem is, I can’t see the answers. What am I missing? We’ve been thinking about doing something similar here, actually. Except not with an agricultural economist. Nor, in fact, with anyone eminent. Just Jeremy and I, at your disposal for a day, to answer questions on agricultural biodiversity, live. What do people think? Worth a try?

Soils and gardens

There’s an exhibition on soil at the Smithsonian in Washington, DC, entitled “Dig it.” And there’s a kids’ book, “Soil! Get the inside scoop,” courtesy of the Soil Science Society of America. I guess the two things are connected. Anyway, they’re both good ideas, and seem to pay due attention to the agrobiodiversity angle.

Speaking of exhibitions, there’s another interesting one relevant to our theme, this one in London. The organizers of IslamExpo have created a traditional Islamic garden at the centre of that busy showcase.

We hope visitors will take a little time out from the main exhibition to wander into one of the four gardens and perhaps sit a while surrounded by the lush planting, under one of the trees of Paradise (pomegranate, fig, date-palm or olive), collecting thoughts or listening to Qur’an recitation or a story by the winner of the Muslim Writers Award, Aliya Vaughan.