Category: Neglected species

Posted on

Making grains relevant

The low-carb craze of a few years back has spoiled the nutritional reputation of cereal grains, and it is up to the industry to get people eating them again. So said Francesco Pantò of the pasta giant Barilla yesterday at the first European congress of the American Association of Cereal Chemists International (AACCI), in Montpellier. He suggested five ways to do that:

  1. develop new durum wheat varieties and special products that can differentiate them, as for grapes and wine
  2. market grains as mainstream and everyday products
  3. use innovative technology to incorporate new grains into familiar products
  4. aim for convenience, and promote the goodness of cereals and fiber
  5. add extra components to cereal products in order to make them into a more complete meal

The first of these will of course be particularly welcome by those of us interested in agricultural biodiversity, and I wonder whether pseudocereals like buckwheat and quinoa might also find a place under the third point.

Posted on

Billionth seed banked

The Guardian reports that the Millennium Seed Bank at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, recently deposited the billionth seed in its genebank. Note, that’s not a billion species, or even a million, but the billionth seed ((Which is to say, an entirely manufactured reason, which worked, for getting a bit of press coverage.)). Normally such blatant manipulation would be beneath our exalted notice, but Kew wisely chose a useful plant on which to bestow this singular honour.

  • In parts of Tanzania women depend on this species for local beer production as a major source of income.
  • It is used to make various types of local baskets for transporting produce, such as tomatoes in Iringa.
  • It is in high demand as a building material. It is used for scaffolding, furniture, general house construction, and fencing. Fences are susceptible to damage by termites and borers. The small stems are used for pipes and arrow shafts

All from FAO, which does not seem to think it is all that endangered. Still, Kew thinks it is worth banking, and that’s good enough for us.

Posted on

FRAME

Courtesy of FAO’s Non-Wood Forest Products Digest – well worth subscribing to, by the way – comes news of FRAME’s Natural Products International Workshop, and some new audio presentations that have just become available on its website. I had not heard of FRAME before. It turns out to be a “USAID-funded program to build knowledge-sharing networks of natural resource management professionals and to help NRM practitioners and decision makers to access and use the existing body of knowledge on successful NRM experiences.”

Posted on

West meets East for diverse recipes

Someone called Mythili, in the US, has been inspired by a conversation with her ((I know, stereotyping, but …)) grandmothers to concoct a series on traditional small grains of India. Mostly recipes, although she may be gathering other kinds of traditional knowledge too from her grannies. Be interesting to see where Mythili’s blog goes with this, but I think interviewing grandparents is a good way for children to get a feel for agricultural biodiversity.

Of course, if you don’t have the sort of relationship in which you can simply talk to older people (or, indeed, anyone) fear not. Help is at hand, in the form of something called an Earth Dinner. I kid you not. The helpful folks at Organic Valley have produced a set of cards you can buy that ask questions like “Describe a family recipe …” Could be valuable if someone were to collate all the results.

Posted on

Using native plants

It may be a bit of a stretch for this blog, but I liked a recent Christian Science Monitor article on the increasing use of native plants – at the expense of exotics – for landscaping in some parts of the US. The authors credit more awareness of climate change, and in particular worries about excessive water use in ever more drought-prone areas, for this shift in attitudes.