- Tonga joins the ITPGRFA. About time too. I started talking to them about it 10 years ago.
- What exactly does it mean to be “amped” about seeds? And do they have to be organic? And do these Filipino ones qualify?
- Enough with the banana scare stories already!
- Go on, nominate someone for the World Food Prize.
- Mushroom beer? Yeah, ok.
- USDA waxes nerdy about cover crops.
- Gateses’ Big Bet for African agriculture. Move along, nothing to see here.
Nibbles: CGRFA, Kew crop job, CC and PGRFA, MAGIC, SDGs, Bushmeat, Biofortification, Protecting trees, Wild coffee, Money honey, Nutmeg story, Colonial cooking, Armenian food
- The Platform for Agrobiodiversity Research breaks down this week’s Fifteenth Regular Session of the Commission on Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture for ya.
- Kew looking for a crop person! I wonder if the successful candidate is in Rome today.
- Mauricio Bellon on why smallholder farmers need crop diversity to adapt to climate change. He’s in Rome.
- Multi-Parent Advanced Generation Inter Cross (MAGIC) deconstructed. Compare and contrast with above.
- The SDGs in one cool interactive infographic. But where’s nutrition?
- Where is overhunting for bushmeat occurring? Gotta get your nutrition where you can…
- Want to invest in a biofortified crop like iron beans? Here’s how to work out where you should do it. Interesting to cross-reference with that bushmeat thing above?
- Ancient Greek tree preservation order.
- Ethiopian forest dwellers protect wild coffee. No preservation orders needed.
- Tracking honey. Follow the money.
- Could say the same about nutmeg.
- Meat stew with garden eggs. Sounds yummie. Not much used in Kenya these days any more, alas.
- Delving into Armenian Ottoman foods. Because we can. No sign of garden eggs.
ABS on genetic resources straight from the horse’s mouth
Braulio Ferreira de Souza Dias, Executive Secretary of the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), recently gave a very nice, clear answer to a question on the relationship between the Access and Benefit Sharing (ABS) regimes of the CBD and of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture. It was at the Special Event on Food Security and Genetic Diversity at FAO last Friday, which preceded the Fifteenth Regular Session of the FAO Commission on Genetic Resources, which started yesterday. You can hear what he says in a couple of different ways. You can fast forward to about 2:07:30 in the video of the event on the FAO website, and watch for about 3 minutes. Or, if you don’t mind only listening, you can click below. Dr Ferreira de Souza Dias focuses on Annex 1 of the Treaty, but of course the collections listed under Article 15 are in the same boat. The questioner is my old friend Desterio Nyamongo, head of Kenya’s genebank.
The Global Crop Diversity Trust meets its stakeholders at Green Week
Lots going on today.
The Crop Trust’s First Stakeholder Discussion will be held on 16 January 2015 in Berlin, Germany, in conjunction with the Global Forum for Food and Agriculture (GFFA), during the annual Green Week International Agricultural Fair. Its thematic focus will be on the central role of international crop collections in preserving crop diversity…
It all starts at 4pm. Follow on Twitter, if you dare. And yes, that’s a new logo and website.
Food Security and Genetic Diversity live, now
The Commission on Genetic Resources will hold its Fifteenth Regular Session from 19 to 23 January 2015 at the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization Headquarter in Rome, Italy. But today, there’s a Special Event on Food Security and Genetic Diversity. Watch it live. And yes, there’s a hashtag.
The Special Event offers an excellent opportunity for delegates of the Commission on Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, policy makers and experts to discuss and exchange information and knowledge regarding linkages between the conservation and sustainable use of genetic resources for food and agriculture and the eradication of hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition. It also allows exploring opportunities to strengthen and improve these linkages and to engage in a dialogue on genetic resources and food security.
And here’s a summary from IISD.