Markets – Page 63 – Agricultural Biodiversity Weblog

January 15, 2019January 15, 2019

Seed sector consolidation and innovation deconstructed

Long story short, I don’t think there is sufficient evidence so far to support the claim that increasing concentration in seed markets reduces innovation. I’m not saying it is impossible; just that the evidence so far does not show it…

Well, that’s a turn up for the books. Koen Deconinck’s OECD study explaining why the recent Civil Eats story making that claim may be wrong is just out, but that quote comes from a Twitter thread which starts with this

Our @OECDagriculture study on concentration in seed markets contradicts several of the points made in this @CivilEats article. I'd like to pick on one argument in particular – that mergers lead to less innovation. This has not been shown. 1/ https://t.co/jwb7j584AV

— Koen Deconinck (@DeconinckKoen) January 14, 2019

and that you can see conveniently unspooled here.

January 12, 2019January 17, 2019

Nibbles: Magic beans et al., Avocado etymology, Honey please, Pig maps, Banana pics, Commons, Diet footprint, Sparing/sharing, Old caviar, Old whiskey, Potato wild relatives, Cassava breeding, Apple double, Ancient potatoes, Ancient grapes, African cooking, Native American craft beer, Agricultural heritage site, Aboriginal biodiversity, Svalbard 10th, Alpaca calendar.

Telegraph op-ed on agricultural biodiversity. Yeah, you read that right.
No, avocado does not come from the Aztec’s word for testicles. It’s the other way around.
Why honey is a keeper.
Mapping the hell out of pigs.
Photo database to help tell bananas apart.
Deconstructing the Tragedy of the Commons.
The C footprint of your diet.
“We can spare 50 percent and share the rest.”
Cave man caviar.
Whiskey with that?
Potato wild relatives and food security.
Cassava and food security. No word on its wild relatives.
Wales finds a new apple.
Maybe someone will take a cool picture of it.
Potatoes were always for the masses. Ok, but not sure anyone ever thought otherwise, though.
Grapes, on the other hand…
The cuisines of Africa get their shot.
Some of those will go well with craft beer.
Agricultural heritage list gets saffron and argan. Bet they go together well.
Maybe wild kiang tea will get there too someday.
Or the Aboriginal Australians. Not really agriculturalists, but still.
Is this alpaca exploitation? Maybe you can take the promotion of agricultural biodiversity too far.
Will the Svalbard Global Seed Vault qualify one day? Ten years on, still going strong. And return to top.

December 31, 2018December 4, 2018

Brainfood: Stressful crops, Quinoa, Ganja genome, Medicinal vetch, CWR in PAs, CWR in Zambian farms, African viral chickens, Naked barley, Farmer trials, Cotton genomes, Tuscan toms, Land sharing, Nigerian goats, Walnut diversity, Bean breeders, Sweet rice

Developing naturally stress-resistant crops for a sustainable agriculture. Can’t help thinking there will be a trade-off.
Quinoa Abiotic Stress Responses: A Review. Case in point?
A physical and genetic map of Cannabis sativa identifies extensive rearrangement at the 2 THC/CBD acid synthase locus. At last, the prospect of better weed.
In vitro anthelmintic effect of Vicia pannonica var. purpurascens on trichostrongylosis in sheep. From Turkish folk medicine to the big time?
Should plant breeders be denied of genetic resources from protected areas? Not if you put it that way. Maybe they should be valued? There’s a way to do that…
Estimating in situ conservation costs of Zambian crop wild relatives under alternative conservation goals. Put it out to tender.
The genetic diversity of local african chickens: A potential for selection of chickens resistant to viral infections. No word on their monetary value, though.
Agro-morphological diversity of Nepalese naked barley landraces. Lots of diversity, little used as yet by breeders.
Generating Farm-Validated Variety Recommendations for Climate Adaptation. One word: tricot.
Reference genome sequences of two cultivated allotetraploid cottons, Gossypium hirsutum and Gossypium barbadense. 13 QTLs for better fibre quality.
Ancient Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) Varieties of Tuscany Have High Contents of Bioactive Compounds. Better than commercial varieties, apparently.
Biodiversity and yield under different land-use types in orchard/vineyard landscapes: A meta-analysis. Land sharing works.
Small Ruminants as a Source of Financial Security Among Women in Rural Southwest Nigeria. Better with education, extension and cooperation.
Analysis of genetic diversity and structure in a worldwide walnut (Juglans regia L.) germplasm using SSR markers. W Europe/N America vs E Europe/Asia.
David Bond and Jean Picard: Two pivotal breeders of faba bean in the 20th century. Bond and Picard?
Status and factors influencing on-farm conservation of Kam Sweet Rice (Oryza sativa L.) genetic resources in southeast Guizhou Province, China. In the end of women and the old.

December 24, 2018November 28, 2018

Brainfood: Glaucous wheat, Iranian barley, Pigeonpea breeding, Automated peas, Bavarian crop diversity, Bean micronutrients, Wheat & CC, Introgression, Crossover, Decriminalizing landraces, Rationalizing Spain, Polish wheat

Genetic Control of Glaucousness in Wheat Plants. Ok, good to know. Now what?
Potential of Iranian wild barley (Hordeum vulgare ssp. spontaneum) in breeding for drought tolerance. Potential, potential, potential. Enough with the potential.
Pigeonpea improvement: An amalgam of breeding and genomic research. “…very few genomic inputs…currently employed at ICRISAT.” Well, why not?
Automated phenotyping for early vigour of field pea seedlings in controlled environment by colour imaging technology. How much money will be saved?
Crop diversity and stability of revenue on farms in Central Europe: An analysis of big data from a comprehensive agricultural census in Bavaria. High prices for a few crops working against the effect of diversity on income stability.
Screening common bean (P. vulgaris L.) germplasm for Fe and Zn biofortication. Almost there with the candidate genes. Almost. Compare and contrast with wheat.
Climate change impact and adaptation for wheat protein. We’ll need better adapted varieties, but even they will not keep pace with grain quality demands.
The extent of adaptive wild introgression in crops. Wild relatives are more than just crop ancestors.
Unleashing meiotic crossovers in crops. It’s all in the RECQ4 gene.
Decentralization and liberalization of seeds and plant genetic resources regulations in Europe: a Danish case study. If you want to grow and trade landraces, Denmark is your place.
Plant genebanks: present situation and proposals for their improvement. The case of the Spanish Network. If you want to have a well-running national genebank system, on the other hand…
Triticum polonicum L. as potential source material for the biofortification of wheat with essential micronutrients. Low strontium too.

December 10, 2018December 7, 2018

Brainfood: ART, Rice diversity double, ABS, Spanish beans, Crop protection, Almond sex, Biotourism, Alpine meadows, Wheat treble, Baobab products, Wild Brassica, Cappello del prete pumpkin, Strawberry fields forever, Cassava seed networks, Indonesian chickens got talent

Andean roots and tubers crops as sources of functional foods. Tasty too.
Development of species diagnostic SNP markers for quality control genotyping in four rice (Oryza L.) species. About 3% misclassification in the AfricaRice genebank.
Analysis of population structure and genetic diversity reveals gene flow and geographic patterns in cultivated rice (O. sativa and O. glaberrima) in West Africa. Natural NERICA. Hopefully this was done after the above.
Conserving Genetic Resources, Access and Benefit-Sharing, Intellectual Property and Climate Change. It’s complicated. Too complicated.
The Spanish Core Collection of Common Beans (Phaseolus vulgaris L.): An Important Source of Variability for Breeding Chemical Composition. The white ones may be better nutritionally. Opportunities to breed for better nutrition AND taste.
The Future of Sustainable Crop Protection Relies on Increased Diversity of Cropping Systems and Landscapes. The efficacy of chemistry is decreasing.
Cross-incompatibility in the cultivated almond (Prunus dulcis): Updating, revision and correction. As most cultivars self-incompatible, you need this information if you want to do any conservation and breeding, let alone actually produce almonds.
Global relationships between biodiversity and nature-based tourism in protected areas. The ideal protected area for tourism is very biodiverse, old, large, near a city and on top of a mountain. Same for agritourism?
Biodiversity-based payments on Swiss alpine pastures. You get more money if you graze smaller, more diverse herds.
Identification of new sources of resistance to wheat stem rust in Aegilops spp. in the tertiary genepool of wheat. 60% of 1400 very wild accessions with no genomes in common with cultivated wheat showed low infection.
Mapping of QTL associated with seed longevity in durum wheat (Triticum durum Desf.). How long before we tailor seed testing and regeneration intervals to accession genotype?
Breeding durum wheat for agroforestry: what to look for? Isn’t nature wonderful?
Consumer Preferences for Baobab Products and Implication for Conservation and Improvement Policies of Forest Food Resources in Niger (West Africa). You could charge a little more and use the money for conservation.
Adaptive significance of functional germination traits in crop wild relatives of Brassica. Could tap wild species for more consistent germination under future rainfed conditions.
Morphological characterisation of Cucurbita maxima Duchesne (Cucurbitaceae) landraces from the Po Valley (Northern Italy). Who needs DNA?
Domestication of Temperate and Coastal Hybrids with Distinct Ancestral Gene Selection in Octoploid Strawberry. The Californian, costal-adapted material is richer in alleles from the N. American parent and is quite distinct from the E. American and European material.
Raising the Stakes: Cassava Seed Networks at Multiple Scales in Cambodia and Vietnam. Self-saved seed dominates, but not completely, with traders important especially in high-intensity cultivation areas.
Knowledge and perception of pelung keepers’s toward chicken contests in West Java, Indonesia. In other news, Indonesia has singing contests for chickens.