Nutrition

March 31, 2011March 31, 2011

Nutritionist tells researchers what to eat shock

According to a report over at the Vaviblog, Bioversity’s nutritionist Jessica Fanzo was beset by questioners after her talk at the Vavilov Institute mentioned both the bad nutritional status of most Russians and the high nutritional value of some fruits and berries at the threatened Pavlovsk Experiment Station. She was bombarded with requests for advice. The Vaviblog’s correspondent reports:

One response stuck in my mind. Jessica was asked whether one couldn’t get all the vitamins and minerals one needs from pills. She said yes, but you have to get everything else from food, so why not the vitamins as well, by choosing your food better?

Especially if you like your potatoes processed and potable.

March 30, 2011March 30, 2011

Yo! Pavlovsk Politicos! Listen up!

Some of the accessions investigated by the project are nutritionally much more valuable than others. Thanks to the project, we know which berries they are. Thanks to Pavlovsk, we have the berries. On that basis alone, surely they’re more valuable than the land they occupy on the outskirts of St Petersburg. Let’s hope that the project team is successful in getting that policy message across tomorrow.

The Vaviblog reports on the first day of an important meeting, a round-up of the project on Conservation, characterization and evaluation for nutrition and health of vegetatively propagated crop collections at the Vavilov Institute.

March 30, 2011March 30, 2011

Zimbabwe revisited; please reward GardenAfrica

A couple of weeks ago I moaned that the description for a project to Support Zimbabwean smallholders to feed their communities and conserve their natural heritage had “failed to set my heart aflutter”. A little wordly magic has now been wrought on the proposal, which I now honestly believe gives a better picture of what the project is setting out to do. The very least you can now do is to reinforce GardenAfrica’s behaviour by heading over to the Coop site and voting for this proposal in the Tackling Global Poverty category.

Thanks.

March 29, 2011March 29, 2011

VIR collection is berry nutritious

Inside the VIR cryotank, a photo by luigig on Flickr.

I’m in St Petersburg for a meeting organized by VIR and Bioversity International on the Luxembourg-funded project “Conservation, characterization and evaluation for nutrition and health of vegetatively propagated crop collections at the Vavilov Institute.” More later, hopefully, at Vaviblog…

March 28, 2011March 30, 2011

Brainfood: Striga, Rice, Fish, Biofortification, Ecosystem functioning, Intercrops

OK, so we’re trying an experiment, siphoning off Nibbles about research, often in peer-reviewed journals, into their own hi-falutin’ cookie jar. We’ll probably publish once a week. And being here doesn’t mean we won’t revisit them later.

Genetic diversity of a parasitic weed, Striga hermonthica, on sorghum and pearl millet in Mali. The parasite is diverse, but no differences in parasitized fields.
Genetic differentiation among Sri Lankan traditional rice (Oryza sativa) varieties and wild rice species by AFLP markers. Four major clusters agree with morphology.
Genetic variation in farmed populations of the gilthead sea bream Sparus aurata in Greece using microsatellite DNA markers. Farmed are less diverse and less heterozygous.
Restoration of hay meadows on ex-arable land: commercial seed mixtures vs. spontaneous succession. No difference in long-term diversity, but there are other considerations.
Bio-available zinc in rice seeds is increased by activation tagging of nicotianamine synthase. It works.
Soil fauna alter the effects of litter composition on nitrogen cycling in a mineral soil. It’s complex; larger fauna affect N dynamics.
Dry matter yield, nitrogen content, and competition in pea–cereal intercropping systems. Intercrops are more productive and deliver higher forage quality.

So what do you reckon? Is this worthwhile?