The Centre for Agroecology and Sustainable Food Systems at UC Santa Cruz has some “instructional resources” on sustainable agriculture online. That’s mainly a course outline and references. There is stuff on agricultural biodiversity in the course outline, but somehow you don’t get the idea – or at least I didn’t – that this is something that is central to sustainability. More of an added benefit, or a fortuitous side-effect. See if you get the same impression.
Another silver bullet?
The discovery of an enzyme which sits at a crucial step on the metabolic journey from glucose to that important anti-oxidant, vitamin C, opens the way for the kind of silver bullet thinking we have previously been somewhat critical of on this blog. Or it may not. We’ll see.
One of the researchers says:
We now have two strategies to provide enhanced protection against oxidative damage: Stimulate the endogenous activity of the identified enzyme or engineer transgenic plants which overexpress the gene that encodes the enzyme.
But I wonder whether this discovery will also allow the rapid evaluation of cultivars for vitamin C content?
Forestry project launched
After Victor Mulinge’s valuable comment on planting mango trees, news of a project designed to help poor people to develop small and medium forest enterprises. It has only just begun, so don’t expect much yet in the way of results. But there is some interesting information and contacts at the project announcement page.
Sweetleaf hits India
I’m always somewhat ambivalent about the kind of story I saw today on Kangla Online about how some farmers in Senaputi district in north-eastern India are taking up the cultivation of Stevia. This is a South American herb in the Asteraceae which is widely cultivated around the world as the source of an alternative to artificial sweeteners.
On the one hand, it is always good to see farmers diversifying and experimenting, including with exotic crops. On the other, you wonder whether there isn’t a local – and locally used – species that might have been promoted and commercialized in this way. And will the money farmers raise from Stevia be sufficient to buy them and their families the nutritious food they will no longer be growing on their land?
From the horse’s mouth
The recent paper showing that climate change threatens the wild relatives of crops received quite a bit of attention yesterday, being as how it was The International Day for Biodiversity. But even though the champagne has all gone and cake crumbs are all we have left, we decided to prolong the festivities just a little. So we called Andy Jarvis, lead author on the study and asked him to share a few thoughts. You can listen here.
You can also hear co-author Annie Lane over at Bioversity International’s news pages.
P.S. This may be the first in an occasional series of podcasts. Have you got something to say? Or would you like to hear someone or something particular? Let us know.