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The Value of Biodiversity to Food and Agriculture

CALL FOR PAPERS

Special Issue of Biodiversity

The Value of Biodiversity to Food and Agriculture

To be released at the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD/COP9) in Bonn, Germany, 19-30 May 2008. The issue will coincide with the review of the Programme of work on Agricultural Biodiversity, as well as with the celebrations of the International Day for Biological Diversity on 22 May on the theme of Agriculture and Biodiversity. The following topics will be considered for publication: 

  • Biodiversity as the foundation for sustainable agriculture
  • Biodiversity and food (nutrition, traditional diets)
  • Soil biodiversity
  • Preservation of rare stocks
  • Indicators for agro-biodiversity
  • Value of taxonomy to biodiversity and agriculture
  • Pollination
  • Bio-control
  • Ecosystems and the value of adjacent protected areas to agricultural land
  • Plant genetic resources, management of wild stocks, farm animal genetics

    • Other related topics will also be considered.  Please submit your abstracts (250 words or less) by 16 November 2007 to the Managing Editor, Stephen Aitken (aitken@tc-biodiversity.org). Space is limited. For more information on Biodiversity please visit www.tc-biodiversity.org. Final papers will be due 7 January 2008, and the publication is scheduled for 15 April 2008.

    Produced in cooperation with the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and partial support from the International Development Research Centre (IDRC), the Ontario Trillium Foundation and Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC).

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    Ethan Zuckerman puts the e- in e-agriculture

    Ethan Zuckerman is a well-respected internet guru. He’s got a blog, called My Heart’s in Accra, on which he muses “on Africa, international development and hacking the media.” He was recently at the Web2forDev conference here in Rome, the centrepiece of e-Agriculture week, where he

    participated in a very strange panel on eAgriculture, where the main topic of conversation seemed to be the fact that none of the panelists quite knew what eAgriculture was or should be.

    That’s from a blog entry with a definite agrobiodiversity vibe, talking as it does about recent innovative solutions to the problem of providing up-to-date price information on commodities to Ethiopian farmers, for example via SMS. Thanks to Kevin for the tip.