Category: Information

The International Year of the Potato has announced a photographic competition, with big prizes to be won. Details are at the IYP web site, which also sets out all the rules and stuff. I find two things about the competition interesting. Closing date is 1 September 2008. For many places, that means you’ve either already taken the photograph, or you have no plans to photograph a maincrop harvest. And the prizes for professionals — “(people who make their living from photography)” — are bigger than those for amateurs. That doesn’t seem quite right. The competition is supported by Nikon.

And that reminds me, it’s time we wrapped up our own competition …

Even if seeds survive climate change and mass extinction in a bomb-proof vault, will anyone remember how to cultivate them?

That, for me, is the money question in an admittedly parochial article from a blog at the Chronicle of Higher Education. Should a Liberal Education Include an Agricultural Education? wonders whether American colleges should be teaching liberal arts students where food comes from, and makes several interesting points along the way. Like, for example, the fact that one can view just about any subject through an agricultural lens. But why restrict it to Liberal Arts students? (A term, incidentally, that I confess I have never fully understood.) Wouldn’t it be good, and useful, for all students to know a little bit more about the food supply and all its ramifications?