Markets

April 4, 2013April 4, 2013

Nibbles: Biofuels, Edible soybeans, Food policy, Nutrition rules, Seed course, TEK index, Doubled haploids, Pigeon fanciers, Gum arabic, Livestock goods & bads, Spanish genebank, SADC seed law, Heirloom tomatoes

Big Oil vs Big Corn. The Economist says End the ethanol tax.
Grow edamame, young farmer.
Agri experts call for a comprehensive food policy in Pakistan. Not gonna happen. There or anywhere else.
But is this where it would start?
Utterly confused by second-hand sources, I’m sending you straight to the horse’s mouth for information on Plant genetic resources and seeds: Community resilience in the face of change, a three week course in November 2013.
Yeah, but will they teach you about Terralingua’s Vitality Index of Traditional Environmental Knowledge?
CIMMYT doubles its haploids centrally now, at least in Africa.
He coulda been a contender, but instead he breeds pigeons. Which is just as good, in my estimation.
Photo essay on Sudan’s gum arabic industry.
ILRI spell out the pros and cons of livestock. Always good to have the data.
Who needs a national seed bank when you can have local ones like this one in Spain?
Remember that draft SADC seed law RAFI didn’t like yesterday? Well, they’re not alone.
Remember that Syngenta tomato that won that award yesterday? Well, now try these.

April 2, 2013April 2, 2013

Nibbles: Roman gardens, Gwich’in video, Medicinals, Crowdsourcing, Genomics in general, Genomics in particular, ICARDA strategy, Growing plantains, Fonio, Fancy chocolate

All nice and rested, we are resolutely back. With the peaceful gardens of Pompeii and Herculaneum.
With the very different lifeways of the Gwich’in.
With Cassandra Quave and her quest for medicinal plants. Not among the Gwich’in, alas.
With Jacob van Etten and his quest for crowdsourcing. Also not among the Gwich’in, who can’t buy a break, it seems.
With Eve Emshwiller (and others) on the joys of genomics.
With Mary Ndila and her efforts to get to the bottom of the good cow/bad cow dichotomy. Using genomics, natch.
With ICARDA’s exhortation to be smart and systematic.
With CTA’s instructions on how to plant better plantains. Presumably by being smart and systematic? Kinda. Not, apparently, by varietal mixing, though.
With ICRISAT’s pean to fonio. And now I need another holiday.
Or a piece of chocolate.

March 29, 2013March 28, 2013

The politics of the language of food

The always stimulating Thinking Allowed on BBC4 devoted last week’s episode to food. There were two interviews. The first was with linguist Guy Cook on his project looking at the specific words and language strategies that the food industry uses to describe its wares. There’s a paper about it too. A number of interesting observations in there, but here’s the one that stuck with me: Prof. Cook’s databases suggest that the word “frankenfoods” is now used much more often by GM enthusiasts to ridicule their opponents than by the green lobby to describe the alleged dangers of playing God.

Sellers at the Piazza Vittorio market in Rome

The second interview was with Rachel Black, Assistant Professor and Academic Coordinator of the Gastronomy Program at Boston University, who talked about her book on what is apparently Europe’s largest open-air food market, Porta Palazzo in Turin. The money quote there was an observation by a native Italian stall-holder that the vegetables being sold by a neighbouring merchant, who happened to be Chinese, were not “nostrani”, meaning “ours”, even though they were pretty much the same as what he was selling, and grown just a few kilometers away.

Nowt so queer as folk, and nowt like language to prove it.

March 27, 2013March 27, 2013

Nibbles: Ag research impact, Old foods, GMOs, Barcoding, Palms (well it is Easter), Medicinal plants, Passion fruits, Markets, Livestock, Chaffey, Wine and CC, Coffee culture

“…for many for many smallholder farmers little has changed over the decades in terms of the methods and tools they use.” Geoff Tansey would seem to agree. Nobody has told ACIAR, though.
Cherfas favourite spread bog butter among oldest food finds.
Why it is silly to say that GMOs are always bad.
The Star Trek tricorder-type DNA widget comes a step closer.
Which will make it easier to do things like working out the evolution of palms. Before it’s too late. Because of all that nasty agriculture. Anyway, read about it on page 3 of Kew Scientist, along with lots of other stuff.
Like the taxonomy of herbal medicine, for instance, which coincidentally also comes up in a newspaper article from Australia today. Maybe some of the plants involved will go into the Kimberly Ark, whatever that is.
Passion fruit is the next big thing in Costa Rica.
Colombian peasant organizations go to market. Including, I bet, with passion fruits.
Even in the struggle between man and steer, the issue is uncertain.
Is it time for Plant Cuttings again? Thank goodness.
I think I’ll read it with some Danish wine at my elbow. Or maybe Vietnamese coffee.

March 15, 2013March 15, 2013

Nibbles: Vigna radiata, Brit foods, Botany power, Niche models, Early ag, Fortification, Chicago plants, De-extinction, Kew aroids, Fish farming fail

WorldVeg fights for the right of Pakistanis to grow mungbean.
Philosopher thinks the English should fight for einkorn. Oh, and stilton.
Botanist fights for botany.
You gotta fight those species distribution models into submission. They don’t come quietly.
Early farmers made love, not war. Or at least made cultic phallic symbols.
Indians avoid Golden Rice fight by fortifying their own.
Chicago fights to save its plants.
You can’t fight extinction. I mean, once it’s happened.
Aroids putting up a good fight with showier plants at Kew.
Aquaculture in a fight for its life as disease looms.