Mike Jackson's account of the early molecular work at IRRI's International Rice Genebank is a nice reminder that the idea of the "genomic genebank" (as he calls it) is not as new as it may sounds. In ...

When we think about crops moving around the world -- and we often do around here -- the Columbian Exchange is the canonical example, and why not? The transatlantic movement of maize, potatoes, ...

FAO has just put out new guidance on capturing wild foods and neglected and underutilized species (NUS) in dietary surveys. It's very much worth a look, even if your interest runs more to grain ...

Is it me, or are there more cassava products... ...in Kenyan supermarkets these days? Production has been up and down, though ...

There is nothing particularly new about the idea that the stuff genebanks conserve should be used. For decades, plant genetic resources specialists have pointed out that conserving crop diversity is ...

Terere (amaranth) is mainly a traditional leafy green vegetable in Kenya of course... ...and readily available these days in ...

Two pieces of work on maize I recently came across are unconnected as to aim and place, but nevertheless make for an interesting combined story. One asks how far maize yield can actually be pushed by ...

Two new studies of very different crops – banana and chrysanthemum, of all things – end up telling surprisingly similar, deliciously complicated stories. For these crops, domestication was not once ...

Mike Jackson’s account of the early molecular work at IRRI’s International Rice Genebank is a nice reminder that the idea of the “genomic genebank” (as he calls it) is not as new as it may sounds. In ...

The National Tropical Botanical Garden (NTBG) awarded Dr. Diane Ragone, founder and director emerita of NTBG’s Breadfruit Institute 1, the 2024 David Fairchild Medal for Plant Exploration. Dr. Ragone ...

I was vaguely aware of the Composite Cross II (CCII) long-term experiment with barley, not least because of a Brainfood entry a couple of years ago. But I didn’t know a whole lot about it, so when a ...

…reminded me that the Amaranth Institute Symposium 2026 is coming up soon. It really is amazing the progress in the marketing and consumption of traditional vegetables that Kenyans have made in the 30 ...