- Crop wild relatives from genebank in use shock.
- Landraces from same genebank in use shock. Hopefully a full blog post is coming soon from the author himself.
- Would you eat this cucumber?
- Dog evolution, again.
- New wild cassava species found.
- Thank goodness for our name-based bioinformatics infrastructure, eh?
- The history of benefit sharing deconstructed. Nothing on ITPGRFA?
- Mexican chili farmers maintain rather than direct with their seed selection.
- My genebank is bigger than your genebank!
A tale of two countries
Exhibit A:
Among 1.5 million children aged 0 to 2 years in communities where the program is implemented, the proportion of those who are underweight has fallen from 30 percent in January 2009 to 20 percent in March 2010. The average decline in the four participating regions … is a strong eight percentage points a year.
Exhibit B:
The ICDS and MDMS are the world’s largest nutrition supplement programs. These apart, 160 million families are given food grains at highly subsidized rates. With about half-a million fair price shops, India’s public distribution system (PDS) is rated as the world’s largest food subsidy program. But, the evidence shows that all these welfare measures have not made a difference.
There’s more to be had from these two reports, on Ethiopia and India respectively but the bottom-line observation, as the Times of India points out, is clear.
India is the world’s 10th largest economy with a GDP of $3.57 trillion and $3,100 as per capita income. Sub-Saharan Ethiopia has the 79th largest economy, with $900 as per capita income. It’s far behind India. Yet, Ethiopia and a handful of other sub-Saharan nations beat India in one of the most critical social indices.
Nibbles: Milk-drinking, Diversity and stability, Indian sheep, Development of the African savannah, Teaching rice, Silk, Diverse diet, Huge phallic inflorescences
- Der Spiegel does its usual impressive number, this time on the Völkerwanderung. Via.
- Diversity and stability in grasslands. Yes, there’s a connection.
- Sheep breeds in India deconstructed.
- The future of the Guinea savannah. Probably not that great.
- IRRI teaches Singaporean cityslickers to grow rice.
- Silk beginning to fade where it was born.
- The diverse benefits of an agrobiodiverse diet. Should someone tell rich Indians?
- Tales of two giant inflorescences. What are the odds?
Nibbles: Abalone, Yak, Forests, Mountain plants, Yams, Ulmus, Apple, Banana
- We now know how to harvest abalone sustainably. Is there anything we cannot do?
- Wild yaks get assessed. Wait, there are wild yaks?
- “…forests played a central role in the rise of the modern state.” Not as flaky as it sounds.
- Andean plants at risk from, well, everything.
- Yams in Nigeria, from festivals to in vitro.
- London’s elms.
- “[L]ike biting into a perfume bottle, but without shards of glass piercing your tongue.” A knobbed russet.
- Banana evolution just got more complicated.
Nibbles: Grapes, Pakistan, Passiflora, Coconut, Assisted migration, Small is beautiful
- Illinois grape breeders turn to wild relatives. Wait, what?
- “Floods wash away Pakistan’s crop research efforts.” And everything else.
- Passion fruits run riot in Lessos, Kenya.
- CIAT experts aim to ease Colombia’s coconut disease squeeze.
- Botanists agonize over assisted migration.
- Gates Foundation puts stop to debate on smallholder productivity.