- Lecture on the enset (and other things) gardens of Ethiopia coming up in November.
- Book on the potato and governance tries to rescue small subsistence farmers from “the enormous condescension of posterity.”
- (Really) ancient Americans may have smoked around the campfire. Tobacco, people, just tobacco.
- Byzantine era wine factory found in Israel. Pass the bottle.
- Meanwhile, half a world away, Indigenous Americans were using their own grapes in their own way.
- Farmers and conservation of crop diversity.
Brainfood: Commons edition
- Seeds of resilience: the contribution of commons-based plant breeding and seed production to the social-ecological resilience of the agricultural sector. A seed production commons is good for agroecology and resilience. At least in the German-speaking vegetable sector. Yeah, but give them an inch…
- Crop Diversity Management System Commons: Revisiting the Role of Genebanks in the Network of Crop Diversity Actors. …and they’ll take a mile.
- Changing patterns in genebank acquisitions of crop genetic materials: An analysis of global policy drivers and potential consequences. Maybe it would be good if they took that mile.
- Seeds as natural capital. This is the mile we’re talking about. It’s worth fighting for.
- A Critical Review of the Current Global Ex Situ Conservation System for Plant Agrobiodiversity. II. Strengths and Weaknesses of the Current System and Recommendations for Its Improvement. It has become a really complicated mile.
- Uses and benefits of digital sequence information from plant genetic resources: Lessons learnt from botanical collections. And this makes it even more complicated.
- Impact of climate change on biodiversity and food security: a global perspective—a review article. Yeah, but look what happens if we don’t do something.
- Agrobiodiversity Index scores show agrobiodiversity is underutilized in national food systems. And we’re certainly not doing enough.
- Endangered Wild Crop Relatives of the Fertile Crescent. See what I mean?
- Crop diversity is associated with higher child diet diversity in Ethiopia, particularly among low-income households, but not in Vietnam. Sure, I know it’s complicated…
- Insights into the genetic basis of the pre-breeding potato clones developed at the Julius Kühn Institute for high and durable late blight resistance. …but just look what’s possible with a little effort…
- Spatiotemporal seed transfer zones as an efficient restoration strategy in response to climate change. …and a little thinking. Well, a lot of effort and thinking.
- Current Advancements and Limitations of Gene Editing in Orphan Crops. And on top of all that, we have this to look forward to.
- Inactivation of the germacrene A synthase genes by CRISPR/Cas9 eliminates the biosynthesis of sesquiterpene lactones in Cichorium intybus L. Well actually it’s already here.
- Living standards shape individual attitudes on genetically modified food around the world. Maybe if they were in a commons? Wait, isn’t this where we started?
- Waive CRISPR patents to meet food needs in low-income countries. It does look like it.
Nibbles: Ancient Levant, Guinness cherry, NBPGR, Maize in Africa
- More than milk and honey.
- A very large cherry.
- A very large genebank.
- Let them eat sorghum, Zambian president says.
- That’s not an option for the Hopi.
Nibbles: Humble spud, Perry obsession, Eating to Extinction, Peasant studies
- The story of the potato in Poland.
- The story of one man’s obsession with the pear.
- Nice extract from Eating to Extinction by Dan Saladino. Get the whole book to get the full story!
- Free version of the classic Food Regimes and Agrarian Questions by Philip McMichael. The story? “Revaluing of food system diversity, and public and planetary health, reformulates the current agrarian question, rejecting food regime capital-centrism.”
Nibbles: Indigenous plant names, Navajo plant specimens, Vivien Sansour, Canarian papas, GMO chef
- The importance of Indigenous plant names.
- The Navajo Nation has a herbarium.
- A Palestinian seed saver rightfully celebrated.
- Ancient potatoes of the Canaries.
- Fancy GMOs for dinner? Wait, what?