- More on how the baobab is coming to Europe.
- Review of breeding for nutritionally improved crops.
- Book on the origins of British gardening.
- Earthworms “modulate the competition between grasses and legumes.”
- ACIAR publishes book on taro pests in the Pacific.
- UNEP launches global pollinator conservation initiative.
- Unusual use for livestock fetuses.
- “And she grows more than 100 types of trees…“
- “Along the equator, without access to refrigeration, you could be dead pretty quickly unless you can find a way to protect yourself against the microbes you ingest every day.”
Nixtamalize this!
Nixtamalization is unquestionably a good thing. Without it
…maize is a much less beneficial foodstuff, and malnutrition struck many areas where it became a dominant food crop. In the nineteenth century, pellagra epidemics were recorded in France, Italy, and Egypt, and kwashiorkor hit parts of Africa where maize had become a dietary staple.
So the question is, why hasn’t alkaline processing been introduced to Africa? Or perhaps it has, and my ignorance is showing again; but if so, why hasn’t it been widely adopted? Ideas, anyone?
Organic shmorganic
So is organic better or what? Not, according to the latest salvo in the debate. Last March a report from the Organic Trade Association in the US said that organic produce had on average a 25% nutritional advantage over the “normal” stuff. But now Prof. Joseph Rosen at Rutgers says in a report for the American Council on Science and Health that the previous study was flawed and the advantage disappears when you compare like with strictly like. That may well be, of course, but a recent paper shows that there are other benefits of going organic. The ecological footprint of organic Tuscan wine was found to be half that of a conventionally-produced tipple. No word on the relative health benefits.
Growing greens in Kenya
The relationship between food, nutrition and health is what is missing in most of Kenya’s homes and even at the national level even when they talk of food security.
Helen Murangi, whose family farms 11 hectares near Kiringa in Kenya, grows all kinds of greens, and stresses their value for good nutrition and as a cash crop.
Murangiri farm has with time come to classify weeds into good weeds, that are now grown intentionally for food and human medicine and the other weeds from which the farm derives its pesticides and herbicides needs. In the class of ‘good weeds’ are such common plants as the Black jerk, Jute (mlenda in Swahili), or murere in Luhya, Kisii), ground nuts, Amaranths, Spider Plant (thangeti in Kikuyu, chiisaka in Luhya, a lot-dek in Luo, saget in Kalenjin), Pumpkin, Crotolaria, Solanum, the various Aloe specie among many others.
According to Helen, what she earns from her small portions of these good weeds combined earns her far more that what she gets from the 7 hecteres she had dedicated to mangos. Interestingly enough, every one in Murangiri’s home is converse with the value of everything that occupies their farm’s space and can explain in detail about each plant and crop—from the biological name, local name, its usefulness etc.
Lots more from the horse’s mouth, as it were, at Africa Science News Service.
Nibbles: Desert garden, Funding, Vegetables, Communication, Ecosystem services, Bees, Native grasses, Soil, Raspberries, Ancient ag trade, Soybeans, Ag origins
- “See how beautiful you can make with small water!”
- IRRI redux.
- The problems of vegetable production in Africa, in microcosm.
- “This is a local production, storage and distribution system, a huge exhibit of biodiversity.’’
- PNAS special issue on ecosystem services.
- Bee books.
- Switch to switchgrass.
- More than you probably want to know about earthworms.
- Evil Fruit Lord questions Scotland-China raspberry deal.
- Ancient crop DNA recovered from underwater amphorae. Totally amazing.
- Nutritionist introduces soybeans to Afghanistan.
- Early PNG agricultural site added to UNESCO World Heritage list.