What we’ve tried to do on a couple of occasions is look at conferences or publications of perhaps only slight overall agrobiodiversity interest and highlight the little bits that do fit here. So it’s nice when someone does it for us. The Ecological Society of America‘s 94th Annual Meeting is currently on in Albuquerque, New Mexico and, among all the other stuff, there’s a session presenting “ideas on how our agricultural practices can take lessons from natural environments.” Fortunately, EurekAlert is there, with summaries of presentations on turning annual crops into perennials, landscape diversity and pest enemies, and reduced tilling and soil microbe diversity. ESA has a blog, EcoTone, as well as a stable of journals. Nature’s blogger is also at the conference.
Nibbles: Drought resistant rice, Bees, Bison, Coffee in Kenya, Cassava in Africa, Pigeon pea, Chickens in Uganda, Green ranching in the Amazon, Climate change, Dates, Museums and DNA, Organic, Ecology meet
- “Sahbhagi dhan is drought-tolerant and can survive even if there are no rains for 12 days.”
- Keeping bees in cities. Not as crazy as it sounds.
- More on the problems of the European bison. What is it with the BBC today?
- Coffee berry borer coming to Kenya. Not boring at all.
- Cassava helping Cameroonians and Ugandans.
- ICRISAT pigeon pea a hit in Kenya.
- Ugandan fishermen crying fowl. What is is with allAfrica today?
- No trees were harmed in the making of this beef.
- “How many of the changes we see happening around us are really attributable to climate change.” Pretty good question. In two parts, be sure to catch both, agrobiodiversity comes into the second.
- How to get a date.
- “By using museum specimens to look back in time, we can potentially assess … [human] impact in detail.” And genebanks, don’t forget genebanks, Olivia.
- Organic better after all. Zzzzzzzzzzzzz.
- Fisheries not as bad as was thought after all. But still pretty bad.
- For best results, use perennials in diverse landscapes and no tilling.
Farmer takes a shot at agri-intellectuals
Blake Hurst is a farmer in Missouri, and something of an anti-Pollan:
…we have to farm “industrially” to feed the world, and by using those “industrial” tools sensibly, we can accomplish that task and leave my grandchildren a prosperous and productive farm, while protecting the land, water, and air around us.
The argument is made very engagingly, with hard numbers as well as telling anecdotes, and a real passion for farming:
Young turkeys aren’t smart enough to come in out of the rain, and will stand outside in a downpour, with beaks open and eyes skyward, until they drown.
But sadly, as ever, the debate is framed as either/or, black or white, organic or industrial, no grey allowed, no nuance:
I deal in the real world, not superstitions, and unless the consumer absolutely forces my hand, I am about as likely to adopt organic methods as the Wall Street Journal is to publish their next edition by setting the type by hand.
And yet Mr Hurst admits to some organic-like practices, such as rotations and the use of manure, on his unashamedly “industrial” family farm. I can’t help thinking, not for the first time, what a step forward it would be if we tried not to think in mutually exclusive dichotomies all the time. Anyway, read the whole thing at The American.
LATER: USDA explores the unexplored potential of biotech crops in an organic setting. Talk about shades of grey.
Crop to Cuisine
That’s the catchy title of a locavore radio programme out of Boulder, Colorado. In the latest episode…
Adam Avery tells us about their team bike ride from Boulder to Durango, and how breweries are doing more than making great beer within their communities. Bill Meyer from the USDA Statistics Service explains the first organic agriculture census. Cindy Torres of the Boulder County Food & Agricultural Policy Council helps us understand the GMO v. Non GMO argument. And Michelle DaPra shares the USDA’s efforts to better understand local food systems.
And all in only 45 minutes. Via.
More organic meta-analysis
Never rains but it pours. Hardly had I finished writing about the dismantling of the “conservation agriculture” narrative, that news is out of a serious going over for (part of) the organic agriculture one as well.
An independent review commissioned by the Food Standards Agency (FSA) shows that there are no important differences in the nutrition content, or any additional health benefits, of organic food when compared with conventionally produced food. The focus of the review was the nutritional content of foodstuffs.
Only about a third of the 162 studies from the past 50 years considered in the meta-analysis saw “a small number of differences in nutrition between organic and conventionally produced food but not large enough to be of any public health relevance.” Studies such as this one, presumably.
This follows a meta-analysis by the American Council on Science and Health which came to a similarly skeptical conclusion. That report was criticized in some quarters. And apparently the Soil Association has expressed some reservations about this latest study and called for better research. We can all go along with that, I think..
LATER. Reaction to the report from Civil Eats, US Food Policy and The Organic Centre. Bottom line is perhaps put best by Parke Wilde:
It is wisest to make your decisions about organic and conventional food primarily based on your assessment of the environmental considerations. The nutrient differences are not as decisive.