- Uganda: “Many youth are no longer idle. They grow vegetables and sell them.”
- Iran: “Rice is becoming a luxury for many of the poor, just like meat and chicken.”
- California: “In nearly every scenario we explored, biodiversity suffers...”
- Australia: “the Australian Fish Names Standard AS SSA 5300 which prescribes standard fish names approved for use in Australia.”
- Pretty much anywhere: “linking small-scale producers to modern markets.”
- Dept. of Silver Linings: “Fuel Costs May Force Some Kids To Walk.” Via.
- Tibet: “I’ve lived here long enough.” Via.
Nibbles: Bananas, Cassava, Coconuts, Potato, Training, Wild poultry, EU regulations, Saving seeds
- No rice? Eat bananas!
- “Whatever the cultivation and consumption of cassava mean to us as Jamaicans, it cannot be just a source of comic relief.”
- Climate change good for coconuts. Well that’s a relief.
- Spud slide show.
- Gubernator helps Chile with its genetic resources. Sarah Connor unavailable for comment.
- Galliformes conservation in SE Asia. No, nothing to do with the French.
- “…the white part of the leek must represent at least one-third of the total length or half the sheathed part.” Yeah, that makes sense.
- “You really see that it’s the poor and persecuted who have been the seed savers.”
Nibbles: Migration, Micronutrients, Taste, Kava, News, Data, Ozone, Chillis
- Rats to New Zealand.
- 300 grand grant to develop an iron bullet.
- Yummie, that tomato tastes very umami!
- “When they call their toxic products ‘kava’, they are misusing the word.”
- Subscribe to the Semilla Besada newsletter.
- Gates Foundation helps FAO improve African agricultural statistics. About time someone did.
- How to conserve rare plants.
- As if climate change is not bad enough, there’s also ozone to worry about. Thankfully, Michigan is on it.
- Boffin uses nanotubes to measure chilli hotness. Useful because some don’t like it hot.
How to build a keyhole garden
Via Hills and Plains Seedsavers, a video from Send a Cow, the people behind the keyhole gardens of Lesotho. To every thing, there is a season, clearly.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjcjCCx3BWYI’m going to quibble, just a bit. Not one of the veggies given a namecheck in the video could be considered local. Are there really no nutritious and neglected species that the people of Lesotho could be growing? I couldn’t find any.
And don’t miss the extended comment on my original post from Jack C, a retired Peace Corps volunteer in Lesotho. His view:
If the outside world wishes to play a role in improving Lesotho, they need to be ready to put up real investments that open up non-agricultural means of economic development. Short of that, the Basotho themselves need to implement the educational, social, and land reforms necessary to give those struggling keyhole gardeners the option of leaving the land. Praise of their industriousness is welcome, but what they truly need are choices. The land can longer support them.
Salutary.
Nibbles: Potato, Cheese, Edible landscapes, Apples, Bees, Cacao, Vegetables
- The Guardian has a leader on the potato. Please let this year end soon. And thanks, Danny.
- Lucy Appleby RIP.
- Inner city farming in the UK.
- Gary Nabhan on where apples came from, and where they’re going. And more. Thanks again, Danny!
- Tracking bees’ response to climate change by satellite.
- Mars thinks cacao biodiversity is important. No news from Earth.
- The “keyhole gardens” of Lesotho.