Category: Tourism

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Nibbles: Museum of Cider, Aport apple, Rattan genebank, Sri Lanka rice, Saudi coffee landscapes

  1. In the UK, Herefordshire’s Museum of Cider is picking up national recognition for its genebank of heritage apple trees. The BBC’s canonical autumnal apple story comes a little early this year.
  2. Speaking of iconic apples, Kazakhstan is scaling up efforts to bring back the Aport, the giant heirloom that once made Almaty famous. No word of museums, though. Or cider.
  3. Over in the Philippines, Department of Environment and Natural Resources is beefing up its rattan genebank to keep pace with demand, with forest stewards in Bukidnon planting seedlings to match. Furniture makers need genebanks as much as cider makers.
  4. Sri Lanka’s pre-Green Revolution heirloom rice varieties, purana haal, are being eyed for their resilience and disease-management potential. Good thing they’re in the national genebank.
  5. Saudi Arabia’s Jazan terraced coffee farms are turning into rural and ecotourism hotspots, proving not all agrobiodiversity needs to be in a genebank to survive. But it helps.
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High on taro

The South Pacific nation of Vanuatu is having its National Agriculture Expo 2026 from August 3–7, 2026, on the northern island of Maewo. I’ve scoured the internet for information about this, but all I could find was social media posts, which I won’t link to, but you can find for yourself quite easily. I will, though, share, with thanks, this photo from one of those posts from Facebook. It’s of the 20-metre tower built by the taro farmers of Maewo, showcasing their product. Because it’s amazing.

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Nibbles: Pearl millet redux, Garden plants, Armenian pics, Seeds galore, Heavenly Book, Pastoralism threats

  1. Pearl millet is getting the hybrid treatment. And, loving it.
  2. Want to know what to grow in your garden? Yes, even pearl millet.
  3. Nice pics of Armenian landscapes, food and foodways. No pearl millet in sight.
  4. The latest monthly newsletter from The Botanist in the Kitchen does seeds. Pearl millet unavailable for comment.
  5. China is genotyping and phenotyping (almost) everything. Pearl millet feeling left out.
  6. If pearl millet fails, there is always pastoralism. No, wait…
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Nibbles: Middle East genebanks, American crabapples, Community seed banks, Indian banana genebank, Legume breeder spotlight, Agrobiodiversity tourism

  1. The Lebanese and Syrian genebanks in the news. For good reasons, for now at least.
  2. Wild American apples should be more in the news. And probably more in genebanks.
  3. Community seed banks could be good news in fragile states.
  4. Good news for India’s banana diversity. Yes, it now has a genebank!
  5. All those genebanks need breeders, like Mina Nešić.
  6. Genebanks are nice of course, but it’s even better news when the agrobiodiversity gets out and about.