Here’s a (relatively) new approach to sustainable genebank conservation, from Chocolate in Context: sponsor an accession. The International Cocoa Genebank in Trinidad will accept donations from US$20, which saves one tree for one year, to US$500, which saves a whole plot (no idea how many trees that is) for 10 years. And another web site, called Yachana Gourmet, preserves a tree on a farm, not in a genebank, and gives you access to tasty chocolate and other goodies.
A good life grown on coconuts
The latest update from COGENT — the International Coconut Genetic Resources Network — is online in the Coconut Google Group. It traces some of the activities of the Kamnoedtone family in Thailand, who have used coconut diversity to improve their lives considerably. The Google group is billed as an “Information exchange for the coconut palm Cocos nucifera” and COGENT is just one of many users. Apologies for my error earlier.
Do intellectual property rights threaten traditional knowledge and livelihoods?
One reason to blog this is that I am intrigued by the headline. The subject is an interim report published by IIED, the International Institute for Environment and Development, an organisation I have long admired. The report is called Protecting Community Rights over Traditional Knowledge: Implications of Customary Laws and Practices, and was issued last November in time for the WIPO meetings in December 2006. I’ve picked it up now because it popped up at Eldis, which, I think, added the title I’ve stolen for the headline above.
What I really want to know, of course, is the answer to that (perhaps rhetorical) question.
Public awareness of global environmental change
Swedish TV has recently shown a series of four programmes on global environmental change called “The Planet.” There’s an accompanying website, and from the blog Resilience Science now comes news of an English-language version. The aim of the website is to “enhance public awareness and knowledge about the Planet and our future, to show the limits, threats and possibilities we are facing today.” So what? Well, unusually for this kind of thing, there’s actually (some) material on agriculture! The website is in Flash, so I can’t link to the actual bit, but just click on the circle labelled “Earth” and you’ll get there. There’s other interesting stuff too.
Tiger wine
Here’s an interesting way of adding value to an agricultural product: take rice, make rice wine, then soak tiger carcasses in it. Not everyone approves.