Markets

October 29, 2014October 29, 2014

Apple pie

It must be the season, but there’s been a ton of stuff on apples on the interwebs recently. Here’s a little sampler:

Problems with Kazakhstan’s apples.
Problems with Britain’s apples.
Cambridge has a solution for those, though.
Solutions, actually.
And then there’s Dan Bussey‘s way.
And Rowan Jacobsen‘s. (He of the Apple Renaissance.) Which basically means documenting every last variety you can find.
They can then all — or the ones you can still find — go into the Seed Savers Exchange collection, say.
I’ll drink to that!
And a teaser…

October 26, 2014October 29, 2014

Nibbles: Wonder Bread, Cassava sex, Languages and biodiversity, Wild Musa, Bronze Age musings, New Indian rice varieties, Improved breeds in Kenya, GMOs in China, Organic vision, Foreign food, Publicity, Nutrition advice & indicators, Ethiopian seed banks, Zimbabwe millet, Agroforestry, MSB legume collection, Demon paywalls, CIMMYT seed, Tempting apple

The industrial sliced loaf as racist fantasy.
Bill Gates talks dirty. About cassava, settle down.
Where the wild things are is where the languages are, but why? And where are they endangered?
This new Indian wild banana is probably a bit endangered.
The past may be a foreign country, but they got Street View there too.
Blockbuster rice in India. (But how energy-efficient is it?)
And potentially blockbuster livestock breeds in Kenya.
China goes GMO. Which of these?
Maybe they should read this vision for organic farming? You know, just for completeness?
Have a food adventure! Just perhaps not in China.
FAO and National Geographic have a food security adventure together. For more stuff like this, no doubt…
Eat more plants, and ditch the junk food. Sounds easy, doesn’t it? Ok, for the more complicated, nerdy approach, there’s always fancy indicators.
Ethiopia’s community seed banks.
I bet there are some in Zimbabwe…
African Development Bank makes a bet on agroforestry. Maybe health is why? There’s more that one reason…
Gotta be strategic with your legume collecting.
Want conservation science to translate into impact? Don’t publish behind a paywall.
CIMMYT earns its keep.
Build a better apple, and you won’t be able to keep the journalists away.

October 21, 2014October 20, 2014

Nibbles: Grassland diversity, Home on the range, Delicate hump, Mexican medicinals, ‘Shrums, Salty potatoes, Salty pigs, Afforestation, Craft beer guy

Diversity rules. In grasslands, settle down.
You want bison with that grassland?
Your hump, sir. Bison shbison.
Federales crack down on medicinal plants.
Including fungi?
Salt-tolerant potatoes in the news, for the wrong reason.
What is it about photos of pigs on a beach? You could grow the above potatoes on the beach and then the pigs could eat them. I’d pay money to see those pics.
Japanese methods used to plant Indian urban forests. Tree planting has a special name?
Peru deals with stunting.
Hero.

October 13, 2014October 13, 2014

Brainfood: Biogeoinformatics, FGR review, Lesser pulses, Slovak orchards, Wheat evaluation network, Iranian olives, Beans & FIGS, Blasted rice, Tibetan pigs, Alpine grass, Development as freedom

Biogeoinformatics of livestock genomic resources. Don’t forget the “geo” bit. Goes for plants as well!
Utilization and transfer of forest genetic resources: A global review. They’ve been going on for 200 years, but we’ll need provenance trials and conventional breeding more than ever in the future. Phytosanitary risks involved in tree germplasm movement are now better managed, but the big problem in the future will be Nagoya. Molecular assisted breeding? Meh.
Genomics and molecular breeding in lesser explored pulse crops: Current trends and future opportunities. We’re mostly still awaiting our jetpacks.
Orchards as traces of traditional agricultural landscape in Slovakia. About half are left, but they won’t save themselves.
A wheat phenotyping network to incorporate physiological traits for climate change in South Asia. Local checks significantly earlier than the best CIMMYT can offer. Evaluate the whole genebank?
Genetic structure of Iranian olive cultivars and their relationship with Mediterranean’s cultivars revealed by SSR markers. The N Iran cultivars are different from everything else.
Leaf traits associated with drought adaptation in faba bean (Vicia faba L.). Chalk up another success for FIGS.
Large scale germplasm screening for identification of novel rice blast resistance sources. 289 out of 4246 accessions showed resistance against all five rice blast isolates. The 4246 chosen on basis of “annotated rice blast resistance information” from the IRRI genebank. No word on whether FIGS was considered.
Genetic Variation of EPAS1 Gene in Tibetan Pigs and Three Low-Altitude Pig Breeds in China. One haplotype seems to be particularly associated with high altitude adaptation. Unclear if that is a really important objective of pig breeding around the world.
Morpho-physiological variation of Poa alpina L. genetic resources from the Rhaetian Alps, Italy, grown in two altitude-contrasting sites. There was more variation within than among populations, and it’s ok to do seed production for high altitude sites at low altitudes. No word on whether same could be said for alpine pigs.
Protection of Traditional Knowledge and Origin Products in Developing Countries: Matching Human Rights and IP Protection with Business Development Opportunities. It’s all in the value chain.

October 6, 2014September 26, 2014

Brainfood: Polyculture services, Apple resistance, Clover seed storage, Oil palm diversity, Alternative foods in Italy, Oregano chemicals, Pig diversity, IPR and indigenous people

Do polycultures promote win-wins or trade-offs in agricultural ecosystem services? A meta-analysis. Yes, at least if the services in question are per-plant yield and biocontrol.
Susceptibility of apple genotypes from European genetic resources to fire blight (Erwinia amylovora). 3 of 40 were resistant.
Effect of sulphuric acid scarification on seed accessions of cluster clover (Trifolium glomeratum) stored in a genebank. Potentially disastrous.
Genetic diversity of the world’s largest oil palm (Elaeis guineensis Jacq.) field genebank accessions using microsatellite markers. 3 groups: extreme W Africa, rest of Africa, Madagascar. Choose parents based on genetic distance, though, not just genetic group.
Introducing territorial and historical contexts and critical thresholds in the analysis of conservation of agro-biodiversity by Alternative Food Networks, in Tuscany, Italy. Alternative Food Networks can contribute to conservation, but they need context.
Chemical diversity among different accessions of Origanum vulgare L. ssp. vulgare collected from Central Himalayan region of Uttarakhand, India. 2 chemotypes, the one with higher thymol mainly from higher altitudes.
Merging Molecular Data for Evaluating Cross Country Genetic Diversity of Pigs. Microsatellite datasets from USA, China and Brazil successfully combined and analyzed together. Should be more of this kind of thing.
How Are Indigenous and Local Communities’ Rights Over Their Traditional Knowledge and Genetic Resources Protected in Current Free Trade Negotiations? Highlighting the Draft Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TTPA). Indigenous people are generally not given stronger rights over their intellectual property in international instruments compared to non-indigenous people. Rights over IP are in general stronger than over genetic resources.