The agricultural industry can seem pretty strange at times. Take rice, for example. There were two very contrasting stories on this crop in the news today. On the one hand, it is making a comeback in Romania, fueled by cheap land, labour and water. But on the other, acreage is plummeting in Korea. That’s due to changes in local consumption patterns and the move towards cash crops like ginseng. Given high world prices, one would have thought that Asian entrepreneurs would be jumping at the chance to supply the European market. But of course, some Asian countries have put in place export bans.
Nibbles: Economics, Agricultural origins, Slow Food, Pollinators, India
- An economist designs a sustainable agricultural system. Good news: it includes genebanks, if only as an additional thought.
- Peruvian rock art marks transition between hunting/gathering and agriculture.
- A food garden on the White House lawn? Via Slow Food Nation, get your tickets quick. And follow the blog. Thanks, Colinski, and have a good time there.
- “The total economic value of pollination worldwide amounted to €153 billion, which represented 9.5% of the value of the world agricultural production used for human food in 2005.”
- “I want the farmers to get the message that what we are doing, what they will be doing when they embrace natural farming, is revolutionary.”
Nibbles: Food, Organic, Halophyte, Aromatic, Botanical garden, Coffee, Verroa mite, Pastoralists
- What’s good here? I love globalization.
- An organic oasis in Egypt.
- Today’s crop of the future: Salicornia.
- English lavender?
- Florida botanical garden collects plants threatened by climate change.
- “Los Delirios is a blend of Caturra, Typica, and Bourbon beans grown near Esteli, Nicaragua.”
- Fungus to help honey bees fight mites.
- “During our grandfathers’ time there were different types of grasses here, some for the cows and others for the goats and sheep. Now there’s no grass, the land has become barren.”
Fennel prices on the go
We have blogged a number of times about the use of mobile telephony to lubricate markets. But the examples have usually been from developing countries. Now here’s one from Italy. And no, I don’t want to get into a discussion about the development status of il Bel Paese. If you register with SMS Consumatori, you can send them a text message containing the name of a product and they’ll send you one back in seconds with the average prices of that product in different parts of the country.
I tried it, and it works. Today the retail cost of 1 kg of finocchio (fennel) was € 1.85 in the north and € 1.30 in the south, for example. If someone is selling something at what you think are inflated prices, you can report them online. The website has a graph of prices for each product over the past few days. And each product also has a sort of descriptive fiche, which even lists the main varieties for some fruits and vegetables, though the price is not disaggregated by variety, alas. Here’s the information on fennel varieties:
… il Bianco Perfezione (varietà precoce, la raccolta avviene in luglio e agosto), il Gigante di Napoli, il finocchio di Sicilia e il finocchio di Parma (varietà invernale, raccolta da settembre a dicembre). Ricordiamo inoltre il Bianco dolce di Firenze, il Finocchio di fracchia, e il Tondo romano. I venditori usano distinguere i finocchi in maschi e femmine: non c’è nulla di scientifico in questo, fanno semplicemente riferimento alla forma che, nel caso del maschio è tondeggiante, nella femmina più allungata.
Ok, I’ll translate:
… White Perfection (an early variety, harvested in July and August), Neapolitan Giant, Sicilian Fennel and Parma Fennel (a winter variety, harvested from September to December). Let us also remember Florentine Sweet White, Fracchia’s Fennel, and Roman Round. Sellers distinguish between male and female types, but there is nothing scientific about this, it simply refers to the shape, which is rounder in the male and more elongated in the female.
Nibbles: Afghanistan, Zucchini
- Support for small-scale private seed enterprises in Afghanistan. Including landraces?
- “It has no real taste of its own, piggybacking on whatever it is prepared with.”