- Wild cotton use lands prize for boffin trio.
- Unesco to protect wild Citrus in India. And read the discussion.
- IV International Symposium on Fig.
- Permaculture: The Podcast.
- The NY Times thinks Americans should eat fewer turtles. And drink more South African wine.
- Meanwile, the WSJ gets into single-source chocolate.
- Nice map of freshwater fish diversity. But will it last? WWF has a plan.
Appropedia
I don’t think much of the name — a portmanteau of appropriate and cyclopedia (which these days connotes wikification) — but the concept of a web site devoted to “Sharing knowledge to build rich, sustainable lives” is appealing for sure. I have not yet had much time to explore, but there is a whole area on Food/Agriculture with some interesting pages. The one on Seed Fairs, for example, is full of useful advice.
Like all such sites, the value of Appropedia will grow with the number of contributors and will depend on those contributors’ diligence. I feel sure that some agrobiodiversity readers would find it useful, and that it would find your contributions welcome.
Via.
Searching for seeds?
Mother Earth News has an online seed finder. It lets you search the “online catalogs of more than 500 mail order seed companies,” mainly in the US, presumably. Test it out and let them know if you could or couldn’t find what you were looking for. We might need to send them our seed list…
2nd World Congress of Agroforestry 3rd Announcement
This just in.
Theme: Agroforestry – The Future of Global Land Use
The Congress will assess opportunities to leverage scientific agroforestry in promoting sustainable land use worldwide. It will also serve as a forum for agroforestry researchers, educators, practitioners and policy makers from around the world to:
- share new research findings, lessons, experiences, and ideas that will help influence decisions that impact on livelihoods and the global environment
- explore new opportunities and strengthen existing partnerships in agroforestry research, education, training, and development
- form new networks and communities of practice, and nurture old ones
Underutilized species given undivided attention
It seems that two key organizations dealing with underutilized crops — the Sri Lanka-based International Centre for Under-utilised Crops (ICUC) and the Global Facilitation Unit for Underutilised Species (GFU), based at Bioversity International in Rome — are merging and establishing a new entity. It will be called Crops for the Future (CroFu) and will be based in Malaysia. Best wishes for the future to CroFu.