- Vavilov does radishes.
- “How would you describe the smell and taste of a fresh white truffle?“
- “The gene … is in an identity crisis.”
- “The basic roll-with-a-hole concept is centuries old.”
- “He slid her gently into a nylon sack and hung her from a scale on which she clocked two kilograms, then slid her out and into the V of a varnished plywood measuring board, where she lay quietly, like a metre-long slab of tenderloin.”
- “Activists” buttonhole Obama.
- The Afghan pomegranate to hit supermarket shelves.
Mine’s a decaff
We’re always on the look-out for examples of the financial value of germplasm collections which don’t involve some obscure and faraway disease, however nasty. So it was really nice to come across a great story about the search for naturally low-caffeine coffee, and in the Wall Street Journal no less. Coincidentally, there was also a blog post yesterday about the wild coffees of Madagascar. ((Yes, dear reader, we nibbled both these things yesterday, but I thought, on reflection, that they were worth a bit more than that.)) Some of the many species found on that island are known to have low caffeine levels, but “[a]ttempts to transfer the caffeine-free property from wild coffee species of Madagascar, which produce an inferior beverage, to C. arabica have failed owing to a strong genetic barrier.”
LATER: I wonder if the recent Korean “land-grab” in Madagascar will have an effect on wild coffees and other interesting endemics.
Nibbles: Food, Potatoes, Medicine, Bees, Beer, Food miles, Fungi, Fruits cubed
- “Food is the most cost-effective intervention.”
- Peru promotes potatoes.
- The Importance of Biodiversity to Medicine. Anyone got access? Any mention of nutrition?
- EU Says bees should rest. Problem solved.
- Extreme beer. All problems solved.
- Eat local? I don’t think so.
- Itchy Italian gourmands gutted over climate change-caused truffle troubles.
- Mulberry trees pay the price for immodesty.
- While fig trees planted by Jesuits survive. It’s a funny old world. Fruit tree trifecta in play.
- And it comes in! Today’s saving-the-frigging-English-apple story comes to you from The Guardian. Enough already, the English apple is going to be fine.
Book of the agrobiodiversity of Guatemala published
My good friend Cesar Azurdia has alerted me to the publication of the book Guatemala y su Biodiversidad. Chapter 9 focuses on agricultural biodiversity. There’s a lot of great stuff on homegardens, crop wild relatives, effects of climate change etc., all subjects very dear to our heart here.
Plan of action against UG99
Despite reassuring words from the Indian Minister of Agriculture at the start of the meeting ((A while ago the Indian Council for Agricultural Research also suggested that UG99 was not a major threat to wheat production in India)), FAO announced that delegates of the 31 countries represented at the “International Conference on Wheat Stem Rust Ug99 – A Threat to Food Security” in New Delhi have pledged to support prevention and control of UG99. They agreed:
- to share surveillance information;
- that a global early warning system should be immediately established;
- that plant breeding research should be intensified; and
- that rust resistant wheat varieties should be distributed to farmers.