Vegetables

September 6, 2013September 6, 2013

Nibbles: Industrial diversity, Forget feed the world, Vegetable evolution, Housekeeping

Slightly extended, slightly fewer edition

Corn (maize) and soybeans are the bogeymen of industrialised, monocropping agriculture, striking fear into the heart of biodiversity lovers everywhere. But, surprisingly, in the US, more than half the production comes from farms that grow at least two other crops. For real specialisation, you need to look at hay and rice. Big tip of the hat to Big Picture Agriculture for that one.
And yet, corn and soybeans power the rhetoric of “US farmers feed the world,” despite more than 40% of US corn ending up as ethanol. (See what I did there?) Anyway, Margaret Mellon at the Union of Concerned Scientists thinks its time to move beyond that unhelpful phrase. “It is time,” she says, “to separate the issues of hunger alleviation and crop production.” It is way beyond time, I say.
And then there’s this: “More Vegetables Evolving Chocolate-Sauce-Filled Centers As Evolutionary Imperative.”
And we’re feeling an evolutionary imperative to shift this particular parasite to a new host. We’ll be attempting to do so over the weekend. With luck, you won’t notice a think when we resume on Monday. See you then.

September 2, 2013September 2, 2013

Brainfood: Pests & CC, Germplasm pix, Latvian legume rescue, Estonian potatoes, NZ genebanks, Yam polyploids, Tree evaluation, Ethiopian veggie, European seed law, Zulu sheep, Celosia management

Crop pests and pathogens move polewards in a warming world. At 3 km/year.
Systems for making NIAS Core Collections, single-seed-derived germplasm, and plant photo images available to the research community. The next level in genetic resources documentation?
Recovering Genetic Resources of Some Legume Species of Latvian Origin by Plant Tissue Culture. You have to work at it.
Overview of in vitro Preservation of Potato and Use of the Gene Bank Material in Estonia. They like coloured potatoes in Estonia.
The key roles of seed banks in plant biodiversity management in New Zealand. Are many and varied.
Microsatellite and flow cytometry analysis to help understand the origin of Dioscorea alata polyploids. Unreduced gametes did it.
Genetic variation in progenies of Jacaranda cuspidifolia Mart using the fan systematic design. Yon can measure genetic variation and evaluate performance under different spacings at the same time, which is important in a tree.
Diversity analysis in Plectranthus edulis (Vatke) Agnew collection in Ethiopia. As ever, a considerable amount of variability was found. Oh hum.
The European seed legislation on conservation varieties: focus, implementation, present and future impact on landrace on farm conservation. There should be more landraces in the Common Catalogue.
Characterization of Zulu sheep production system: Implications for conservation and improvement. If they’re so drought tolerant, why is drought threatening them? Well, there’s drought, and then there’s drought.
Effects of paraquat on genetic diversity and protein profiles of six varieties of Celosia in South-Western Nigeria. That would be a tasty and diverse local leafy green. Well, before the paraquat anyway.

August 29, 2013August 29, 2013

Nibbles: Golden Rizzzzzz, Agronomy meet, Pricey poultry, Pricey Indian food, Target environments, NUS galore, G&T

The Golden Rice thing rumbles endlessly on.
I wonder whether it was discussed at the First International Agronomy Day. I bet that fertilizer thing in Malawi was.
The world’s most expensive cock. Made you look!
I wonder whether you can select sex in chickens like you can in cattle.
Anyway, speaking of expensive agrobiodiversity, a celebrity economist rounds up links on Indian food price inflation. Must have seen our recent stuff on onions. But can you grow them on the roof?
The secret of breeding? Location, location, location.
List of “indigenous” fruits and vegetables of allegedly potential global importance without a damn scientific name anywhere. Annoying on many levels.
Mind you, this piece on the threats faced by the wild herbs of Crete also doesn’t have any names.
See, you can include a scientific name of an underutilized plant and not look unbearable geeky. Well, kinda. Although this press release on burgeoning collaboration on NUS manages to avoid mentioning even common names.
Oh I so need a drink.
And some cheese.

August 28, 2013

Nibbles: Golden Rice vs kitchen gardens, China vs world, Cool fungi, Measuring nutrition outcomes, Ancient pig keeping, Mapping potatoes, Plant evolution, Supporting genebanks

Golden Rice better than kitchen gardens? We just don’t have the data. But why is that?
Brazil and China compete for African agriculture. Are either of them at this African food security conference? Meanwhile, Australia vs China in the Pacific. Are either of them contributing to this ecosystem management survey? Oh, what could possibly go wrong?
The “beauty” of mycorrhiza. And more cool fungi.
World Bank says it is possible to measure nutritional outcomes in children without breaking the bank.
It wasn’t just ancient farmers who kept pigs.
CIP uses GIS shock.
Darwin’s abominable mystery sorted out. Oh, and cereal vernalization to boot.
Nabhan: The U.S. government should direct more money to the country’s “underfinanced seed collection and distribution programs.”

August 27, 2013August 27, 2013

The further deconstruction of Indian onion prices

A quick follow-up to our post a couple of days back on the price of onions in India. Yesterday the Wall Street Journal, no less, weighed in on the subject, with a reference to a report commissioned by the Competition Commission of India (CCI) to get to the bottom of…

…volatility of onion prices and its relationship with distribution in the what the CCI described as a “loose and casual market.”

According to one of the authors, quoted by the WSJ:

There is almost an oligopoly kind of situation and until there are multiple players, the price will be dictated by a few traders.

So it’s all down to those pesky middlemen, it seems. Farmers have no chance:

Farmers generally take reference of the local markets’ rates, while traders compare rates of all markets, including major distant and export markets and then decide where to send their produce

Ah, but wait. There’s also news of a World Bank pilot project to crowdsource price data on agricultural commodities which may solve that little problem. Here’s the onion data from last year. ((Thanks to Tariq Khokhar for the help in tracking this down.)) I’m not sure whether in due course we’ll also have this year’s, and thus be able to see that 200% year-on-year increase in July mentioned by the WSJ.

I guess the real challenge is to get these numbers out in real time, and in a way that farmers can make use of. There’s clearly a way to go:

What did we learn? The results from the pilot tell us that, yes, the crowd can collect reliable and timely prices – but you need to provide incentives and implement good verification and validation processes. The resulting data are comparable over time and space, and timeliness is pretty good — the time lag is only about a month. And, importantly, the resulting data are open to all users.

A good start, no doubt, but I’m not sure that a month after the event is going to be of much use to farmers. Other similar efforts are underway, though, so maybe one of these “thousand points of light” will emerge as a bit brighter than the others. After all, if weather, why not prices?

Why is this important for agricultural biodiversity? Well, for a start, markets have been touted as the saviours of neglected and underutilized crops, and maybe even landraces of the more successful and overused sort. Wouldn’t do if they were “loose and casual”, now would it?

Meanwhile, can we have the same for fish?