Agricultural Biodiversity Weblog

February 9, 2022February 9, 2022

Shake up of PGRFA in Russia?

Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree establishing the National Center for Plant Genetic Resources.

Wait, isn’t there one already?

The President decided to establish such a center on the basis of the Federal Research Center “All-Russian Institute of Plant Genetic Resources named after N. I. Vavilov.”

Wait, what does “on the basis” mean?

In order to ensure coordination of the activities of the National Center for Plant Genetic Resources, I decide:

1. Establish an Interdepartmental Commission on the Formation, Preservation and Use of Collections of Plant Genetic Resources…

Ah, ok.

The Interdepartmental Commission on the Formation, Preservation and Use of Collections of Plant Genetic Resources (hereinafter referred to as the Commission) was established to ensure coordination of the activities of the National Center for Plant Genetic Resources (hereinafter referred to as the National Center).

So what is this National Centre though?

The Chairman of the Commission is the director of the federal state budgetary scientific institution “Federal Research Center All-Russian Institute of Plant Genetic Resources named after N.I. Vavilov”.

Fair enough.

Stay tuned. Thanks to Isby for digging all this up.

February 7, 2022February 7, 2022

Brainfood: Japan support, American food choice, Wild potato x4, Phenotype change, Minor Vigna, Tilapia diversity, Ethiopian chicken diversity, Goat diversity, Tree seeds, Blockchain

Three Decades of Safeguarding and Promoting Use of Agricultural Biodiversity: Changing Global Perspectives, Paradigm Shifts and Implications. The priorities of Bioversity and the Japanese government have changed over time, but miraculously stayed reasonably well aligned.
A focused ethnographic study on the role of health and sustainability in food choice decisions. Americans pick food items mainly on the basis of price, health, taste, and convenience. Environmental impact, not so much, alas.
Wild relatives of potato may bolster its adaptation to new niches under future climate scenarios. Some wild potato species have unique climate adaptations that we’re going to need.
Cold Hardiness Variation in Solanum jamesii and Solanum kurtzianum Tubers. Case in point.
Assessment of Wild Solanum Species for Resistance to Phytophthora infestans (Mont.) de Bary in the Toluca Valley, Mexico. And not just climate adaptation.
Screening South American potato landraces and potato wild relatives for novel sources of late blight resistance. Case in point.
The pace of modern life, revisited. A big database on how the phenotypes of wild species like the above are changing, and why.
Insights into the genetic diversity of an underutilized Indian legume, Vigna stipulacea (Lam.) Kuntz., using morphological traits and microsatellite markers. 94 accessions, 12 with promise for different traits, in 7 genetic groups. Let the really efficient breeding commence.
Whole genome resequencing data enables a targeted SNP panel for conservation and aquaculture of Oreochromis cichlid fishes. The breeding has already commenced between different tilapias, but don’t worry, we can now tell species apart.
A framework for defining livestock ecotypes based on ecological modelling and exploring genomic environmental adaptation: the example of Ethiopian village chicken. 25 populations, but only 12 ecotypes, based on 6 climate variables. Basically the same methodology as the wild potato paper above but applied to genetic groupings. Who will apply it to tilapias now, or indeed that “minor” Vigna?
VarGoats project: a dataset of 1159 whole-genome sequences to dissect Capra hircus global diversity. Distinct African, Asian and European genetic groups. Well I never.
Are Tree Seed Systems for Forest Landscape Restoration Fit for Purpose? An Analysis of Four Asian Countries. Take a wild guess. The key is apparently focusing less on planting lots of trees and more on making sure the resulting forests are resilient.
Smart, Commodified and Encoded: Blockchain Technology for Environmental Sustainability and Nature Conservation. Not quite ready to help grow those resilient forests.

February 1, 2022

Regular readers will know that while we’re big fans here of African traditional vegetables, we are also skeptical about the usefulness of formal “protection” for foods. So I for one am a tiny bit conflicted about some recent news from Kenya:

The Intergovernmental Committee for Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage, upon the proposal, has selected Kenya’s success story of promoting traditional foods and safeguarding traditional foodways in Kenya as a programme, project, or activity best reflecting the principles and objectives of the Convention.

But only a tiny bit. Congratulations to everyone involved.

February 1, 2022

A juicy tomato story

Jeremy’s latest newsletter has a useful snippet on a paper on the history of the tomato in Europe. I’ll reproduce it below as a taster, but consider subscribing, as there’s lots of other interesting stuff too, on everything from pizza to chocolate.

Maybe you saw those beautiful illustrations of 16th century tomatoes that were doing the rounds a few days ago. They were prompted by a lovely paper from the Netherlands looking at the earliest tomatoes in Europe. The paper may be a bit heavy going, but the researchers published their own summary for the rest of us.

The paper sheds light on those first tomatoes to arrive, and in particular on the notion that these first fruits “were elongated, segmented, and gold in color. After all, that is how they were depicted, and they were called ‘pomo d’oro’: golden apple.” Herbarium specimens and old drawings, many of them newly digitised, revealed many different colours, shapes, and sizes, but not whether tomatoes originated in Peru or Mexico, the two leading candidates. The Dutch researchers sequenced the highly degraded DNA of their specimen and say that it was definitely not a wild plant, and shows strong similarities with three Mexican varieties and two from Peru.

The indigenous Andes population in Peru started domesticating a small wild cherry tomato. They brought this to Mexico, and there they developed the tomato with large fruit that we know today.

No herbarium specimen is ever likely to germinate, so to find out how these first tomatoes in Europe might have tasted the best bet, they suggest, is to go to Mexico and Peru. DNA analysis could probably indicate the closest known relatives for a taste test.

Now, will someone please examine critically the whole “tomatoes didn’t catch on because they were considered poisonous” thing, or is there already enough proof of that?

January 31, 2022January 31, 2022

Brainfood: Genebanks, Covid, Sustainable intensification, Anthropocene, Biodiversity value, Cropland expansion, Better diet, Biodiversity indicators, Climate change impact, Soil fertility, Agroecology & GMOs

Global assessment of the impacts of COVID-19 on food security. Resilience, but at a cost.
Avenues for improving farming sustainability assessment with upgraded tools, sustainability framing and indicators. A review. How to measure an important aspect of the above-mentioned resilience.
Envisaging an Effective Global Long-Term Agrobiodiversity Conservation System That Promotes and Facilitates Use. To effectively guarantee the resilience of farmers and the food system, genebank accessions for likely future use need to be distinguished dynamically from those for immediate use on the basis of the best available data, and then managed differently.
Widespread homogenization of plant communities in the Anthropocene. Naturalization of phylogenetically diverse exotic plants from Australia, the Pacific and Europe is leading to a more homogeneous world flora. Much the same could be said of diets, come to think of it, except maybe for the geographic source of the plants, which is interesting in itself.
Identifying science-policy consensus regions of high biodiversity value and institutional recognition. And less than a third of the bits of the Earth that everyone thinks are important in terms of biodiversity are protected, including from the above exotics.
Global maps of cropland extent and change show accelerated cropland expansion in the twenty-first century. There was a 9% increase in cropland area in 2003-2019, mainly in Africa and South America, half of it replacing natural vegetation.
Include biodiversity representation indicators in area-based conservation targets. Needed because of the above exotic invasives and cropland expansion, among other things.
Climate impacts on global agriculture emerge earlier in new generation of climate and crop models. Those new cropland areas will soon be in trouble. Unless genebanks and plant breeding, I guess.
Can agroecology and CRISPR mix? The politics of complementarity and moving toward technology sovereignty. Could that cropland grow gene-edited crops in an agroecological setting? Yes, but that will require recognizing that agroecology is not a setting.
Plant biodiversity and the regeneration of soil fertility. Restoring biodiversity restores soil fertility too.
Small targeted dietary changes can yield substantial gains for human health and the environment. Replace just 10% of meat calories with fruit and veggies for the win-win. Is this the answer to all of the above? Well, maybe, maybe not.

Agricultural Biodiversity Weblog

Posts

Shake up of PGRFA in Russia?

Brainfood: Japan support, American food choice, Wild potato x4, Phenotype change, Minor Vigna, Tilapia diversity, Ethiopian chicken diversity, Goat diversity, Tree seeds, Blockchain

Preserving vegetables

A juicy tomato story

Brainfood: Genebanks, Covid, Sustainable intensification, Anthropocene, Biodiversity value, Cropland expansion, Better diet, Biodiversity indicators, Climate change impact, Soil fertility, Agroecology & GMOs