Agrobiodiversity is crops, livestock, foodways, microbes, pollinators, wild relatives …
Robert Hijmans writes:
I would like to submit this video to the competition:
The video shows IR64, a widespread rice cultivar, and IR64-sub1 growing side by side on a field at IRRI that experiences a (simulated) flash flood. IR64 is badly affected, IR64-sub1 comes out much better.
The 8th African Crop Science Society meeting will take place in Egypt from 27 to 31 October. Could be some interesting papers, if anyone survives scrutiny of the conference web page). We keep saying this, and we keep meaning it: if any reader is at the meeting and wants to send a report, we’ll be happy to receive it.
Botanic Gardens Conservation International wants YOU to make a film! I hope some of them at least will be about the agricultural biodiversity that botanic gardens conserve and study — crop wild relatives, for example. But hey, don’t forget we have a video competition here too!
Remember Jeremy has an omnibus post about Chinese agrobiodiversity.
NB: Update here.
We interrupt this blog for a public service announcement. The Indian Express is reporting a proposal by the government of Jharkand State in northeast India to bulldoze the field genebanks of the Horticulture and Agro Forestry Research Programme. More than 20 years of work and thousands of fruit varieties are set to be destroyed in order to create bungalows for Members of Parliament.
What to do? This makes the UK’s attempts to dump its apple and pear collection look positively suave. We’ve alerted people who might have some influence. But seriously, what else can be done? Is anyone in Jharkand taking this up? How about the rest of India? We’re rank amateurs at activism. Advise us.
We wouldn’t normally repost an entire item, but this is important enough that we’re making an exception. So here goes.
Continue reading “Indian fruit genebank threatened by democracy”