- Seeds of resilience: the contribution of commons-based plant breeding and seed production to the social-ecological resilience of the agricultural sector. A seed production commons is good for agroecology and resilience. At least in the German-speaking vegetable sector. Yeah, but give them an inch…
- Crop Diversity Management System Commons: Revisiting the Role of Genebanks in the Network of Crop Diversity Actors. …and they’ll take a mile.
- Changing patterns in genebank acquisitions of crop genetic materials: An analysis of global policy drivers and potential consequences. Maybe it would be good if they took that mile.
- Seeds as natural capital. This is the mile we’re talking about. It’s worth fighting for.
- A Critical Review of the Current Global Ex Situ Conservation System for Plant Agrobiodiversity. II. Strengths and Weaknesses of the Current System and Recommendations for Its Improvement. It has become a really complicated mile.
- Uses and benefits of digital sequence information from plant genetic resources: Lessons learnt from botanical collections. And this makes it even more complicated.
- Impact of climate change on biodiversity and food security: a global perspective—a review article. Yeah, but look what happens if we don’t do something.
- Agrobiodiversity Index scores show agrobiodiversity is underutilized in national food systems. And we’re certainly not doing enough.
- Endangered Wild Crop Relatives of the Fertile Crescent. See what I mean?
- Crop diversity is associated with higher child diet diversity in Ethiopia, particularly among low-income households, but not in Vietnam. Sure, I know it’s complicated…
- Insights into the genetic basis of the pre-breeding potato clones developed at the Julius Kühn Institute for high and durable late blight resistance. …but just look what’s possible with a little effort…
- Spatiotemporal seed transfer zones as an efficient restoration strategy in response to climate change. …and a little thinking. Well, a lot of effort and thinking.
- Current Advancements and Limitations of Gene Editing in Orphan Crops. And on top of all that, we have this to look forward to.
- Inactivation of the germacrene A synthase genes by CRISPR/Cas9 eliminates the biosynthesis of sesquiterpene lactones in Cichorium intybus L. Well actually it’s already here.
- Living standards shape individual attitudes on genetically modified food around the world. Maybe if they were in a commons? Wait, isn’t this where we started?
- Waive CRISPR patents to meet food needs in low-income countries. It does look like it.
Brainfood: COVID & seeds, Livestock integration, Farm diversity, Diet diversity, Genetic diversity, Cassava landraces, Wild coffee, Variety registration, Kava kastom, Neolithic Europe
- Viewpoint: COVID-19 and seed security response now and beyond. Think before you spread seeds around.
- Integrated crop-livestock system with system fertilization approach improves food production and resource-use efficiency in agricultural lands. Integrating livestock in soybean production is good for the amount of energy produced per unit of nutrient applied, if that’s what floats your boat.
- Holistic agricultural diversity index as a measure of agricultural diversity: A cross-sectional study of smallholder farmers in Lilongwe district of Malawi. An interesting way of measuring overall farm diversity. But is there a link with dietary diversity?
- Dietary diversity scores, nutrient intakes and biomarkers vitamin B12, folate and Hb in rural youth from the Pune Maternal Nutrition Study. Dietary diversity is linked to better micronutrient status. But is there a link with genetic diversity?
- Evaluating surrogates of genetic diversity for conservation planning. There’s nothing quite as good as neutral markers, alas.
- Phenotypic diversity assessment within a major ex situ collection of wild endemic coffees in Madagascar. Never mind the species or genetic diversity, look at the trait variability.
- Understanding cassava varietal preferences through pairwise ranking of gari‐eba and fufu prepared by local farmer–processors. Landraces are sometimes better than improved varieties.
- Do the importations of crop products affect the genetic diversity from landraces? A study case in garlic (Allium sativum L.). Apparently not, surprisingly enough.
- Overcoming barriers to the registration of new varieties. DUS needs genomics. But what about registering landraces? Do we need a completely separate system for that?
- Legal geographies of kava, kastom and indigenous knowledge: Next steps under the Nagoya Protocol. One approach implementing Nagoya at the community level. But is it scalable?
- New evidence on the earliest domesticated animals and possible small-scale husbandry in Atlantic NW Europe. There was a long period of contact between local hunter-gatherers and incoming farmers, resulting in a transitional farmer-herder stage.
Nibbles: Svalbard, Amazon fires, China genebank, Gardening, CPVO
- Nice genebanks mashup from the always-excellent Mongabay.
- Analyzing social media to understand how forest governance is perceived. I want to do it for genebanks now…
- …Genebanks such as China’s wild plants genebank, for example.
- Thomas Fairchild was a genebanker of sorts 300 years ago.
- Once genebanks have been used by breeders, and varieties released (at least in Europe), you’ll be able to find them in the CPVO Variety Finder. I’m sure Fairchild would be impressed.
Nibbles: Soil day, Gold Rush orchards, Bogota heirlooms, Geographical indications, Coffee industry, Plant Treaty
- Soil diversity is important too, FAO says.
- There’s (agricultural) gold in them thar hills.
- Even the hills of Bogotá.
- Using collective IP rights to protect agricultural and other biodiversity.
- Coffee is 40 years behind other crops, but will business step up?
- More $$$ for the Benefit Sharing Fund.
Brainfood: Genebank technology, Genebank research, Apple genomes, Napier genome, Wheat genome, Blue maize, FACE, Pigeonpea diversity, Millet domestication, Ancient dogs, Ancient bovids, Domestication syndrome, Date pollen, Commons, Genetic diversity trifecta
- New technologies to improve the ex situ conservation of plant genetic resources. Genebanks need to catch up with the latest science even just to maintain their seeds.
- Advanced Strategic Research to Promote the Use of Rice Genetic Resources. High-throughput phenotyping and genome sequencing are the latest science that will make the most of those seeds.
- Phased diploid genome assemblies and pan-genomes provide insights into the genetic history of apple domestication. Analysis of genomes of two main wild progenitors plus the crop uncovers genes so far untapped for improvement.
- The elephant grass (Cenchrus purpureus) genome provides insights into anthocyanidin accumulation and fast growth. It’s related to pearl millet, apparently. Which may or may not be a good thing. No word on any genes so far untapped for improvement.
- Triticum population sequencing provides insights into wheat adaptation. Wide adaptation is largely due to introgression from the wild. No word on any genes so far untapped for improvement.
- The Right Tortilla for the Right Occasion: Variation in Consumers’ Willingness to Pay for Blue Maize Tortillas Based on Utilization. Consumers are willing to pay 42% more for blue tortillas, but only when eating out, presumably as part of virtue signalling.
- 30 years of free‐air carbon dioxide enrichment (FACE): What have we learned about future crop productivity and its potential for adaptation? That enrichment wont save us, that’s what.
- Phenotypic Divergence Analysis in Pigeonpea [Cajanus cajan (L.) Millspaugh] Germplasm Accessions. From 81 accessions to 9 promising ones, at least for Malawi.
- A model for the domestication of Panicum miliaceum (common, proso or broomcorn millet) in China. Domestication took 3000 years.
- Origins and genetic legacy of prehistoric dogs. All dogs are descendants of a now extinct wolf population, and their genetics show both interesting parallels with, and divergences from, that of humans.
- Brain Size Does Not Rescue Domestication Syndrome. Not even for humans, I suspect. Kidding apart, this is fascinating. It suggests that, for animals at least, the domestication syndrome is not actually a thing. Or at least has not been properly tested. If there’s interest, I’ll do a full post. Let me know in the comments below.
- Ancient genomes reveal tropical bovid species in the Tibetan Plateau contributed to the prevalence of hunting game until the late Neolithic. The now tropical gaur ranged much further north during the warmer Neolithic, which facilitated the exploration of the Tibetan Plateau.
- Optimization of in vitro germination and cryopreservation conditions for preserving date palm pollen in the USDA National Plant Germplasm System. Always good to have another way of storing germplasm.
- Beyond the material: knowledge aspects in seed commoning. Comparing global with local seed commons reveals importance of managing knowledge, both scientific and traditional.
- Genetics to the rescue: managing forests sustainably in a changing world. To manage forests sustainably, you have to conserve and use their genetic diversity. Interesting that they needed a conference to work that out.
- Genetic mixing for population management: from genetic rescue to provenancing. And using that genetic diversity could mean mixing it up.
- The importance of genomic variation for biodiversity, ecosystems and people. Maintaining ecosystem services means maintaining genetic diversity. Sounds like these authors went to the same conference.