- Executive Director of CBD perpetuates myth that we have lost 75% of crop diversity, at high-level meeting, no less.
- 670 agroforestry trees in a database, courtesy of ICRAF.
- Last Rice Today of this year, the 50th anniversary of the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), summarized.
- Soil community helps maintain species and genetic diversity.
- Good news for some UK bumblebees.
- On the agricultural frontier in South America. Any crop wild relatives there?
- Global Network of National Geoparks expands. Any crop wild relatives there?
Mellow fruitfulness on sale
Who says there’s no agricultural diversity in American supermarkets?
Nibbles: Melongena, Nutrition, Wheat, Pavlovsk, Farming, Phosphate, Lesotho, Almonds
- “Its flavor is like the saliva generously exchanged by lovers in kissing.” Yum!
- ECOWAS Nutrition Forum continues to sell “multi-sectoral approach to tackling under-nutrition” in West Africa.
- Six new varieties of wheat in Oman! Splitters rule.
- US scientists urged Russians to save Pavlovsk. Lotta continua.
- And here’s the Russian Housing Development Foundation’s take on the expert report. Lotta continua sempre.
- COPs may come and COPs may go — but will we be ready for the Peasant Olympics in 2012? h/t Miss Hathorn.
- Phosphates in China: waste ’em while you can?
- Book: Conservation agriculture and sustainable crop intensification in Lesotho.
- Australian almond variety not performing this year.
Nibbles: Heat, Pastoralism, Yams, Caimito, Pavlovsk, Beans, Tomatoes, Trees, Grasslands, Rice in LAC, Fossil sunflower, Apples, Fish in Africa
- Unpacking the heat of chillies.
- Debating pastoralism, a new journal.
- Celebrating (instead of growing?) yams.
- Economic Botany releases free download of paper on caimito domestication.
- More than 50,000 people care about Pavlovsk Experiment Station. Unstoppable?
- A bean diversity fair was held in Uganda on the 21st of June 2010. Did we miss it then?
- Searching for the Blue Zebra … tomato. Wonder if AVRDC know about it.
- Those blogging diplomats — How to make a scarf from a tree.
- Tibet’s disappearing grasslands. Pastoralists see item 2 above.
- IRRI DG says, in Latin America, that Latin America could be next global rice bowl. Well, he would, wouldn’t he. Very data-heavy presentation.
- One VERY remote sunflower wild relative. Very cool.
- Chaffey’s regular words of wisdom on anything botanical. Well, mostly wise. But more on that later…
- The history of the apple in the early US.
- IUCN does for African freshwater fish what it does best. Ring the alarm bell.
Nibbles: Ireland, Plumpy’nut, Saola, Food heritage protection, Millet, Wild veggies, Brassica, UNMDGs, Ukraine
- Celebrating the Irish Seed Savers Association celebrations. We had wanted to be there…
- CAS-IP on how to “break” the Plumpy’nut patent.
- Cattle wild relative seen for first time in 10 years. Well, by scientists anyway.
- “Initiatives that merely codify cultural products without taking the social-organizational context into account risk becoming little more than ‘museums of production.'” Ouch.
- Millet domestication pushed back in time.
- Antioxidant properties of traditional wild Iberian leafy greens. Yes, I know, this medicalizes nutrition, but I thought it was interesting that these wild species are still used.
- “…a trait of the diploid species, which apparently looks undesirable, might in fact be highly valuable for the improvement of amphidiploids…”
- “Food? We don’t need no stinkin’ food,” say UN negotiators.
- UK ambassador’s observations on agriculture in Ukraine. Love the contrast between 100 ha fields of sunflowers and the table groaning under home-grown fruit and vegetables.
- In other news, the UK’s ambassador to Ukraine has a blog. And so do a number of others. Sorely tempted to subscribe to their RSS.