Category: Training

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Colorado State PGR course runs again

From Dr Pat Byrne, Professor Emeritus of Plant Breeding and Genetics at Colorado State University.

Colorado State University Online will offer 3 one-credit courses in Fall 2024 on Plant Genetic Resources Conservation and Use. Courses are targeted to the upper undergraduate/graduate student level and can be taken sequentially or independently. Course instructors are Dr Geoff Morris (CSU), Dr Davina Rhodes (CSU), and Dr Gayle Volk (USDA-ARS). The courses are as follows:

  • SOCR 501 – Plant Genetic Resources: Origins, Aug. 19 – Sep. 22. Discover the origins of plant genetic resources, their domestication and diversification, their genetic and genomic properties, and their vital role in global food systems.
  • SOCR 502 – Plant Genetic Resources: Conservation, Sept. 23-Oct. 27. Examine the role of genebanks in the global effort to conserve plant genetic resources. Explore each step from collection to storage, regeneration, and distribution.
  • SOCR 503 – Plant Genetic Resources: Discovery, Oct. 28-Dec. 8. Learn how breeders overcome the challenges of unadapted germplasm, how novel traits and genetic variants are discovered, and how they get from genebank to plant breeders, then on to farmers and consumers.

For more information on course content, fees, and registration, visit PGRCourse.colostate.edu.

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How to get training in crop diversity conservation redux

Every once in a while I get the urge to remind everyone where they can get information on training courses in crop diversity conservation, and indeed training materials.

So, anyway, of course there’s the Plant Treaty. A couple of online courses are available, on the Treaty itself and on Farmers’ Rights.

Then there’s USDA’s GRIN-U. Great range of topics, materials and formats.

The Millennium Seed Bank Partnership at Kew Gardens also has a bunch of training opportunities.

And finally there’s BGCI’s Online Training Platform. You need to register for the online courses but it’s worth it.

It’s kind of crazy that there isn’t a more formal place than a random blog post where different organizations can share opportunities and direct people to the right training for them, but there we are.

LATER: Oh gosh, how could I forget CGN’s courses? And indeed other offers from Wageningen, such as this on seed systems.

EVEN LATER: There’s also the Applied Plant Conservation Course from the Center for Plant Conservation.

AND FINALLY… the MS in Plant Genetic Resources Conservation and Management from the Crop Breeding and Genetic Resources Laboratory, Institute of Crop Science, College of Agriculture and Food Science, University of the Philippines, Los Baños.

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Nibbles: Cider exhibit, Dog domestication, Nordic rye, Orkney barley, Tunisian wheat, IPR in Kenya, Future Seeds, Seed & herbarium resources

  1. The Museum of Cider has an exhibition on “A Variety of Cultures.”
  2. Nice podcast rounding up the latest on dog domestication.
  3. Useful summary of the history of rye in the Nordic countries since it replaced barley in the Medieval period.
  4. They didn’t give up barley in the Outer Hebrides.
  5. The Tunisian farmer goes back to wheat landraces (I think).
  6. The Kenyan farmers who want to exchange landraces.
  7. El Colombiano visits Future Seeds, evokes The Walking Dead.
  8. Seed saving resources from the California Seed Bank and the herbarium at the University of California, Berkeley.
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Nibbles: Fonio beer, ICRISAT seed kits, Dark Emu, China potatoes, 3D genebank, Bioculture, Microbiome genebank, Nutrition, Michigan kiwi

  1. You can make beer from fonio.
  2. ICRISAT providing Niger and Chad with sorghum and pearl millet seed kits. Fonio next?
  3. No, Echinochloa turneriana next. In Australia. I love the Dark Emu Hypothesis, and not least for its name.
  4. CIP is helping China improve its potato crop.
  5. Won’t be long before China’s genebank has 3D images of all its holdings. I’d love to see the potatoes.
  6. Want to see the earliest known site of domestication of teosinte?
  7. UK builds first crop biome cryobank.
  8. How the private sector can help with a more nutrition-sensitive agriculture. Should it want to.
  9. You can grow kiwi in Michigan. Should you want to.
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Nibbles: Alt-proteins, NPGS, Serviceberry, Fungal diseases, Old Irish farm

  1. The benefits of alt-proteins spelled out in a report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies. I bet they’ll need alt-genebanks.
  2. The US national genebank system expertly deconstructed in a page.
  3. Bozakmin, the best of the berries, used to contrast late stage capitalism with Indigenous gift economies. Well worth the long read.
  4. Comment in Nature about how we are not taking fungal diseases of crops sufficiently seriously.
  5. There’s a place in Ireland with a 6000 year history of farming. Well maybe that’s rounded up a bit.