Category: Policy

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Brainfood: Genebank metrics, Genebank reviews, Botanic gardens ABS, Genebank practical guides, Germplasm User Groups

Want to know what AI makes of the above? “Genebanks are sharpening their tools: new metrics set benchmarks for performance, peer reviews foster collaboration, and the Plant Treaty offers clearer rules for sharing, FAO’s practical guides make standards easier to apply, while Germplasm User Groups show how farmers benefit when genebanks open their doors.” Sounds good to me. But to what extent will also this be adopted around the world, and will it last?

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Nibbles: Supermarkets, Cate Blanchett, ABS, Transformation, Medieval haymaking, Aurochs rewilding, Breed concept

  1. What’s wrong with supermarkets.
  2. Cate Blanchett on the Millennium Seed Bank. Attitude to supermarkets unknown.
  3. Access & Benefit Sharing 101. Cate Blanchett unavailable for comment.
  4. Experts weigh in on how we should change how we eat. Nobody but Cate Blanchett will listen, but supermarkets and seeds feature, for what it’s worth.
  5. How they ate in the Middle Ages without supermarkets. Or at least harvested.
  6. After we’re done with medieval haymaking, let’s bring back the aurochs too. And put it in a supermarket?
  7. Yeah but what is a breed anyway? Or an aurochs, for that matter.
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The Kunming Manifesto surfaces

Readers with a long memory will remember that I promised I would keep an eye on the manifesto that was supposed to come out of the 3rd International Agrobiodiversity Congress, held back in May. Well, it has arrived, the 2025 Kunming Manifesto: Agrobiodiversity for People and Planet. Here’s a taster:

The agrobiodiversity conservation, use, and success stories are largely the domain of women, who are often the most marginalized in marginalized groups. In tandem with greater inclusion, unlocking agrobiodiversity’s potential to help solve the world’s greatest challenges requires transformative intervention by governments around the world. This includes repurposing agricultural subsidies, enacting policies to support the seed production and distribution systems and embedding agrobiodiversity in the global fora that work to mitigate climate change, reverse biodiversity loss, control desertification, and eliminate hunger.

There are “actionable recommendations” on each of the topics of the Congress…

  1. Agrobiodiversity for Economic Growth
  2. Agrobiodiversity for Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation
  3. Agrobiodiversity for Improved Environmental Health and Biodiversity
  4. Agrobiodiversity for Healthy Diets
  5. Agrobiodiversity for Gender and Social Inclusion
  6. Agrobiodiversity Conservation and Management Strategies

…followed by suggested “next steps” for farmers and practitioners, policy makers, scientists, and the private sector.

Anything on genebanks? Well, lots on community seed banks, that’s for sure. But also this:

Because community seed banks are vital platforms for action learning and seed system strengthening, incentives and rights-based policies should be implemented to reward the contributions of custodian farmers. Additionally, increased support is needed for local and national genebanks, enhanced documentation and conservation of wild PGRFA and landraces, and greater investment in participatory plant breeding. Stronger national policies that enable farmers to commercialize seeds of farmer varieties need to be in place.

I have to say that, given some the people involved, I would have expected at least a passing reference to international genebanks, but I guess this particular Congress wasn’t the right place for that.

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Nibbles: USDA Pullman genebank, Another Indonesian genebank, Somali community seedbank, Garlic moves genebanks, Enset conservation, Opportunity crop genebanks

  1. A primer on the USDA genebank in Pullman.
  2. Possible genebank in Indonesia. I could have sworn there was one already.
  3. Community genebank in Somalia. Surely not the only one.
  4. Garlic moves between genebanks. I’m sure there’s a reason.
  5. New enset products and processing methods are great, but is there a comprehensive genebank? I wish I could be sure.
  6. That goes for other “opportunity crops” and “forgotten foods” too.