- Sensory sacrifices when we mass-produce mass produce. You need consumer-assisted selection.
- The palaeogenetics of cat dispersal in the ancient world. Two Middle-Eastern sub-populations of one sub-species contributed to domestication, at different times, and the result spread first with agriculture and then aboard ships. But we haven’t changed them in the same way we’ve changed dogs etc. You don’t say.
- U.S. ratification of Plant Treaty: benefit sharing ambiguity for plant genomics researchers does not change. But what about genomics data?
- Wading Into the Gene Pool: Progress and Constraints Using Wild Species. Introduction to the Special Section on CWR.
- Plant ecological solutions to global food security. Introduction to the Special Feature on Ecological Solutions to Global Food Security. The intersection with the above is probably here.
- A multiplex PCR for rapid identification of Brassica species in the triangle of U. Now there’s no excuse.
- Connecting Earth observation to high-throughput biodiversity data. I don’t see any reason why the same thinking couldn’t be applied to crop diversity.
- Linguistic diversity of natural UNESCO world heritage sites: bridging the gap between nature and culture. 80% of Natural WHSs intersect at least one indigenous language.
- Overcoming barriers to active interventions for genetic diversity. Embrace the hybrid by focusing on process, not form.
- Utilization and farmers’ knowledge on pigeonpea diversity in Benin, West Africa. For some reason, farmers don’t like coloured seeds.
Seed saving in Tanzania in the spotlight
An article in Mint Press News suggests that a new law in Tanzania will not only give foreign investors “faster and easier access to agricultural land in the African nation, as well as strong protections for ‘intellectual property rights,’ e.g., seed patenting,” but also forbid seed saving and exchange.
In addition, seeds that are not patented – i.e., all seeds traditionally used by Tanzanian farmers – are now forbidden from being sold or even given to friends or family, threatening the centuries-old tradition of seed exchanges that have kept costs down for farmers. Michael Farrelly of the Tanzania Organic Agriculture Movement (TOAM) told Mondiaal Nieuws that “Eighty percent of the seeds are being shared and sold in an informal system between neighbors, friends and family. The new law criminalizes the practice in Tanzania.”
All in return for aid, allegedly. The Seed Treaty is brought in as a last line of defence:
However, the new laws themselves are likely illegal under international law, as Article 9 of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (ITPGRFA), also known as the “Seed Treaty,” states that no law should “limit any rights that farmers have to save, use, exchange and sell farm-saved seed/propagating material.” But affected Tanzanian farmers will likely be unable to make a viable court case against the new legislation due to their limited economic resources.
It’s worth quoting Article 9 in full:
Article 9 – Farmers’ Rights
9.1 The Contracting Parties recognize the enormous contribution that the local and indigenous communities and farmers of all regions of the world, particularly those in the centres of origin and crop diversity, have made and will continue to make for the conservation and development of plant genetic resources which constitute the basis of food and agriculture production throughout the world.
9.2 The Contracting Parties agree that the responsibility for realizing Farmers’ Rights, as they relate to plant genetic resources for food and agriculture, rests with national governments. In accordance with their needs and priorities, each Contracting Party should, as appropriate, and subject to its national legislation, take measures to protect and promote Farmers’ Rights, including:
a) protection of traditional knowledge relevant to plant genetic resources for food and agriculture;
b) the right to equitably participate in sharing benefits arising from the utilization of plant genetic resources for food and agriculture; and
c) the right to participate in making decisions, at the national level, on matters related to the conservation and sustainable use of plant genetic resources for food and agriculture.
9.3 Nothing in this Article shall be interpreted to limit any rights that farmers have to save, use, exchange and sell farm-saved seed/propagating material, subject to national law and as appropriate.
So that’s not quite the same as what the Mint Press News piece said, as I read it. It’s not that no law should “limit any rights that farmers have to save, use, exchange and sell farm-saved seed/propagating material.” It’s that nothing in Article 9 should be interpreted as so doing. The Treaty recognizes the pivotal importance of Farmers’ Rights, including to seed saving and exchange, but leaves it to national government to figure out how to realize them.
Nibbles: IPR handbook, People’s food, Open seeds, Club apples, Comms, Indian mangoes, Chili history, Bitter cassava, Better yams
- IPR for indigenous peoples.
- A People’s Food Policy released today.
- Free the Seed! A sort of example of the above?
- Are club apples a sort of example of the above?
- Historical mangoes are disappearing in Hyderabad. If only they’d been, you know, protected.
- The origin of spicyness in (some) chilis.
- The downside of cassava in Venezuela.
- The upside of better seed yams in Nigeria.
- Ag comms: don’t be an eagle or a chicken. I’m a parrot, myself. Circumspice.
Brainfood: Arracacha diversity, Mediterranean diet, Asian sheep & goats, Alpine flax, Breeding efficiency, Models, Domestication & seed size, Palm uses, CC & production, Insecticide & diversity
- Assessment of genetic relationships between cultivated arracacha (Arracacia xanthorrhiza Bancr.) and its wild close relatives in the area of domestication using microsatellite markers. Lots more variation in the wild, natch.
- Exploring Relationships between Biodiversity and Dietary Diversity in the Mediterranean Region: Preliminary Insights from a Literature Review. There has been an increase in dietary diversity, but of the wrong sort of diversity.
- Special issue Of Small Ruminant Research on “Genetic diversity of small ruminants in Asia”. From the Punjab Urial sheep to the goats of Myanmar.
- Genetic diversity of flax accessions originating in the Alpine region: a case study for an ex situ germplasm evaluation based on molecular marker. Past genebank conservation hasn’t been perfect.
- Enhancing genetic gain in the era of molecular breeding. It all starts with genetic variance. Hello, genebanks!
- Crops In Silico: Generating Virtual Crops Using an Integrative and Multi-scale Modeling Platform. Factor in gene editing and goodbye genebanks.
- Unconscious selection drove seed enlargement in vegetable crops. And not only vegetables, cereals too. But remember African rice?
- Palm economic and traditional uses, evolutionary history and the IUCN Red List. Globally, the more threatened palms are the less used.
- Impact of Climate Change, Weather Extremes, and Price Risk on Global Food Supply. The effect is not just on production, but also price.
- Identifying the landscape drivers of agricultural insecticide use leveraging evidence from 100,000 fields. In Kern County, California, crop diversity decreases insecticide us. But…
Brainfood: CWR prioritization, CWR data, Yam core redux, Traditional landscape value, African rice domestication, Digital conservation, First farmers, Revived breed, Mitigation targets, Zoonoses, Population, JEB on legumes
- Broadening the Base, Narrowing the Task: Prioritizing Crop Wild Relative Taxa for Conservation Action. Use socioeconomic value of crop, and potential usefulness and threat status of relative.
- Germinate 3: Development of a Common Platform to Support the Distribution of Experimental Data on Crop Wild Relatives. Useful in determining the second of the above.
- Re-defining the yam (Dioscorea spp.) core collection using morphological traits. Cleaning up the core.
- “Things are different now”: Farmer perceptions of cultural ecosystem services of traditional rice landscapes in Vietnam and the Philippines. 73 indicators for the contribution of landscapes to culture, aesthetics, and local knowledge.
- A single-nucleotide polymorphism causes smaller grain size and loss of seed shattering during African rice domestication. You want no shattering? You also get smaller seeds. Like it or edit it.
- Digital conservation: An introduction. Brave new world… Special issue of Ambio.
- The Genomic History Of Southeastern Europe. Souther Greek Neolithic farmers not same as other European Neolithic farmers.
- Genomics of a revived breed: Case study of the Belgian campine cattle. Racial impurities are confined to a few farms.
- Reducing emissions from agriculture to meet the 2 °C target. We’re doomed.
- Conservation of biodiversity as a strategy for improving human health and well-being. By keeping animals and their nasty diseases away from people, we’re not talking communing with Nature here.
- The interaction of human population, food production, and biodiversity protection. Minimise the interaction.
- Nature’s pulse power: legumes, food security and climate change. Special issue of Journal of Experimental Botany on legumes. Eat up your beans!