Category: Mainstream

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Nibbles: Tree planting, Restoration genebanks, Breadfruit Summit, Rice diversity demand, Irish Seed Savers, Jordan bread, Peanut recipes

  1. Rules for tree planting.
  2. Where those trees will have to come from: thousands of seed banks.
  3. Not if the tree is breadfruit, but that’s ok, there’s other ways to conserve the stuff.
  4. The impact of a single seed bank on rice improvement measured.
  5. The impact of Irish seed banks recognized.
  6. No need for genebanks to save heirloom wheats in Jordan.
  7. Lost opportunity to mention peanut genebanks, but that’s ok there’s other ways to conserve the stuff.
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Nibbles: GRIN-U, Canadian seeds, Jordan genebank, Green genebank, Millets everywhere, Saving livestock diversity, Sustainable smallholders, Uli Westphal, Eat This Tomato

  1. Lots of new stuff on GRIN-U. Check out the genebank success stories in particular. How many of the things below will be successes? Lots of luck to all of them…
  2. Showcasing seeds in Canada.
  3. Setting up a new genebank in Jordan.
  4. Let’s hope it will be eco-efficient like CIAT’s. Other GROW webinars here. Yes, they’ve started up again.
  5. Embracing millets in southern Africa and India.
  6. Why livestock should not follow the example of Charles II of Spain.
  7. Supporting traditional sustainable farming in Central America.
  8. More on Uli Westphal‘s cool illustrations of crop diversity.
  9. Which include tomatoes. Don’t forget to subscribe to Jeremy’s pod.
  10. And subscribe to the GRIN-U newsletter too while you’re at it!
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Nibbles: New cassava, Community seedbank double, Rwandan beans, Knotweed et al., Seed systems, Adam Alexander, Uruguay genebank, Kelp biobank

  1. There’s a new cassava in town in Kenya.
  2. I wonder if it will end up in a community “seed” bank.
  3. …because they swear by them in Zimbabwe.
  4. Cassava is not the only American crops that’s important in parts of Africa: the cultural appropriation of beans in Rwanda.
  5. Some American crops didn’t make it very far out of America.
  6. Be it beans, cassava or sump/knotweed, what’s needed is a Quality-Declared Seed (QDS) system. Right?
  7. Well you also need someone to go around collecting the stuff in the first place.
  8. But don’t forget to back everything up in Svalbard, like Uruguay is doing.
  9. Well maybe not everything.
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Nibbles: Old olive, Silphion, Heirloom watermelon, Calabrian chili, ICARDA genebank, Jamaica genebank, Tamil community seedbank, Forestry seeds

  1. Really old olive tree in the gardens of the mosque-cathedral of Cordoba is a lost variety.
  2. Long extinct medicinal spice plant not extinct after all?
  3. The next nearly extinct heirloom on our list is a watermelon from Virginia. Who knows, it may originally have been grown in Cordoba or Cyrenaica…
  4. And moving in the opposite direction, a really hot Calabrian chili pepper beats the heat.
  5. The ICARDA genebank is trying to find stuff that will beat the heat too.
  6. Jamaica is looking to beat the heat by establishing some new genebanks.
  7. Tamil Nadu going the community seedbank route, and why not? Jamaica please take note.
  8. An alliance of forestry outfits is pushing for a global seedbank infrastructure to support woodland restoration. Nothing if not ambitious. And much needed.