Agrobiodiversity is crops, livestock, foodways, microbes, pollinators, wild relatives …
The Guardian has a photo essay on how farmers are trying to cope with climate change in Tajikistan. 1
Turaqulov Saidmuzator, a farmer in Temumalik district, is experiencing the effects of climate change. ‘I think the weather has become warmer in the last four or five years and that is affecting our crops,’ he says. ‘The sickness of our crops is increasing but the pesticides are expensive and we are losing almost 30% of our crops to diseases.’
Andre has “great, great trouble with the data” from that vegetables and PVP paper:
For instance, the table says that no turnip has ever been PVP protected; according to the Office’s data base, two have been. The authors highlighted in a previous paper, with a ‘hurrah’, that Fowler and Mooney made a math error in their 1983 “Shattering…”. They also succumb to a simple subtraction at the bottom of the first column.
There’s more. Over to the authors… BTW, our original source was the CAS-IP blog.
“Cherry trees require a minimum of 8,000 hours of low temperatures over the winter to produce the optimum blossoms, but as Japan gets warmer we are falling short of that figure,” said [Dr Abe].
“And that is a problem because we Japanese love cherry blossom season.”
Dr. Abe’s team has responded to this national crisis by creating a cherry tree that blooms in all four seasons, keeping its flowers for longer, producing more blossoms and under a wider range of temperatures than any existing breeds.
How? A combination of radiation and grafting. Which means that one will now be able to wear the Human Polllination Suit all year round.
Peter [Curran] meets the botanists who won the lottery. Seed conservation used to be rather marginal to the main scientific activity at The Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew. That is, until, the scientists who preserve seeds for future generations asked for and received 30 million pounds.
It’s a BBC programme and you have 7 days left to listen to it. It provides an interesting insight into a particular, albeit unique, genebank — if you can get past Mr Curran’s sardonic attitude.
Wangari Maathai, tree-hugger and board member of the Global Crop Diversity Trust, has been in Japan seeking Japan’s leadership for the conservation of agricultural biodiversity, in advance of the Nagoya meeting of the parties to the Conference of Biological Diversity in October.
“If we don’t protect what we have, you never know what the scientists of tomorrow will need” to allow people to produce crops that could not grow before, she said, adding, “That is why these diversities are important.” She talked about her visit to a Kyoto temple where she learned the Japanese word “tomoiki,” which refers to the concept of coexistence with nature, and said it is “something the world needs to learn.” Maathai became widely known for adopting the Japanese word “mottainai” — loosely meaning “You should save it” — in trying to promote awareness of environmental protection among Japanese people.
Nice word, mottainai.