156 replies to this topic

[caltrek]

The Dirty Truth About Oat Milk

 

https://www.motherjo...-iowa-nitrogen/

 

Introduction:

(Mother Jones) Move over, almond and soy milk: An oat milk boom, as I argued in a piece last year, could help the Midwest solve some of its most dire agricultural issues. And now there’s new research out this month to help support the case for covering the region with oats.

 

In states like Iowa, fertilizer runoff from corn and soybean farms pollutes drinking water and feeds algae blooms, fouling water from local lakes and rivers down to the Gulf of Mexico. These farms also lose soil to erosion at an alarming rate, compromising the region’s future as a crucial hub of the US food system.

 

Back in 2013, I reported on “one weird trick” that could go a long way toward solving these problems: biodiversity. When farmers add more crops to their dominant corn-soybean rotation, it disrupts weed and pest patterns and means they can use fewer pesticides. It also frees up space for planting legumes, which capture nitrogen from the air and reduce the need for synthetic fertilizer. One great contender for this third crop is oats.

 

 

The article also gives yet one more example of how government subsidies often just distort the market in ultimately unfavorable ways:

 

Another obstacle, Hunt says, are the “heavily taxpayer-subsidized crop insurance programs that keep farmers locked into a corn- and soybean-producing system year after year, even when market prices are poor,” as they have been for the past several years.

 

bhofack2

[caltrek]

Memories of eating influence your next meal – new research pinpoints brain cells involved

 

https://theconversat...involved-109713

 

Introduction:

(The Conversation) Studies done in people support the idea that meal-related memory can control future eating behavior.

 

When researchers impair the memory of a meal by distracting healthy participants while they eat – such as by having them play computer games or watch television – people eat more at the next opportunity. The opposite is also true: enhancing meal-related memory by having people reflect on what they just ate decreases future intake.

 

Patients suffering from amnesia do not remember eating and will eat when presented with food, even if they have just eaten and should feel full. And memory deficits are associated with overeating and increased weight in relatively healthy people.

 

So what’s going on? We all know that we don’t eat just because we’re hungry. Most of our decisions about eating are influenced by a myriad of other influences that have nothing to do with how hungry or full we are, such as time of day, the sight and smell of food, or an advertisement for a favorite restaurant. My lab has chosen to focus on memory, in part, because it is something that is adaptable and more within our control.

 

Conclusion:

  Our research adds to the growing body of evidence that suggests that techniques that promote hippocampal-dependent memories of what, when and how much one eats may prove to be promising strategies for reducing eating and promoting weight loss.

[caltrek]

Wild coffee species threatened by climate change and deforestation

 

https://www.nature.c...586-019-00150-9

 

Introduction:

(Nature) Most of the world’s wild coffee species have a high chance of going extinct in the next several decades due to more frequent and lengthy droughts, loss of forests and the spread of deadly pests, according to a study1 published on 16 January in Science Advances.

 

The findings signal a potential threat to the multibillion-dollar coffee industry that’s dominated by two varieties — arabica (Coffea arabica) and robusta (Coffea canephora) beans. Arabica is susceptible to high temperatures, whereas robusta is sensitive to dry soils. But the genetic diversity within some of the 124 wild species could help breeders to boost the viability of commercial plants in the face of a changing climate.

 

“A number of coffee species have traits that allow them to grow in hostile and drier conditions,” says study co-author Aaron Davis, a coffee researcher at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, in London. “But if you start losing species, you start losing options.”

 

A forest nursery for coffee plants in Ethiopia.

Credit: Emily Garthwaite

[caltrek]

Scientists Call for 'Global Agricultural Revolution' and 'Planetary Health Diet' to Save Lives—and Earth

 

https://www.commondr...diet-save-lives

 

Introduction:

(Common Dreams) While scientists continue to call for immediately phasing out fossil fuels across the global to avert climate catastrophe, a team of international experts on Thursday unveiled a proposal to address another major driver of the climate crisis: the world's unhealthy and unsustainable food system.

 

"The food we eat and how we produce it determines the health of people and the planet, and we are currently getting this seriously wrong," declaredTim Lang, a co-author of the EAT-Lancet Commission and professor at City, University of London. "We need a significant overhaul, changing the global food system on a scale not seen before in ways appropriate to each country's circumstances."

 

The commission brought together 37 experts in agriculture, environmental sustainability, human health, and political science from 16 countries. Over three years, they developed the "planetary health diet," which aims to address the global food system's devastating environmental impact as well as mass malnutrition.

 

Noting that more than 800 million people worldwide "have insufficient food, while many more consume an unhealthy diet that contributes to premature death and disease," co-lead commissioner Dr. Walter Willett of Harvard University said the "world's diets must change dramatically" to reverse the damage that's been done.

 

In a new report about human health and the environmental, experts call for people across the globe to follow a "flexitarian" or "planetary health" diet.

(Photo: The EAT-Lancet Commission)

[caltrek]

Are microbes causing your milk allergy?

 

https://theconversat...-allergy-110093

 

Introduction:

(The Conversation) In the past 30 years, food allergies have become increasingly common in the United States. Changes to human genetics can’t explain the sudden rise. That is because it takes many generations for changes to spread that widely within a population. Perhaps the explanation lies in changes to our environment, particularly our internal environment. Shifting lifestyle practices over the last half-century – increasing antibiotic and antimicrobial use, surface sterilization, air filtration and changes to diet – have changed our internal environment and wiped out important bacteria with beneficial health effects.

 

For many years, my research group at the University of Chicago has been exploring the role that intestinal bacteria play in preventing allergic responses to food. Bacteria, together with viruses, fungi and other small organisms living in and on our bodies, collectively make up the microbiome and play a critical supporting role in health.

 

The microbiome is our internal environment. Humans and microbes have “grown up” together: As humans evolved, so did their microbes. We tend to think of health practices as changing slowly, but from the perspective of the bacteria in our guts, changes in their composition and function have happened more quickly – and the results are dramatic.

Intestinal bacteria and allergies.

 

Several years ago, my research group, together with a collaborator in Italy, Roberto Berni Canani, was comparing the bacteria present in infants with a diagnosed cow’s milk allergy to those without. We found some remarkable differences between the two groups. This led us to wonder whether the different bacteria present in each of the two groups are sufficient to protect against allergy. And if so, could we figure out why?

 

To test this idea, we transplanted the entire microbiome of the two different groups – the healthy infants and those allergic to cow’s milk – into special laboratory mice that were bred in a completely sterile environment, with no bacteria of their own. The idea was simple: If we transplant the different groups of bacteria into mice, will the mouse become allergic to cow’s milk or not?

 

 

 

Bacteria (red) reside among the epithelial cells (blue) and the mucus (green) of a mouse small intestine.

 UChicago, cnagler@bsd.uchicago.edu, CC BY-SA

[caltrek]

Asian Food Delivery Startup Raise $4.5 Million

 

https://techcrunch.c...wbus-raises-4m/

 

Introduction:

(Tech Crunch) When one food delivery startup fails, another gets funded.

 

Chowbus, an Asian food ordering platform headquartered in Chicago, has brought in a $4 million “seed” funding led by Greycroft Partners and FJ Labs, with participation from Hyde Park Angels and Fika Ventures. The startup, aware of the challenges that plague startups in this space, says offering exclusive access to restaurants and eliminating service fees sets it apart from big-name competitors like Uber Eats, Grubhub, DoorDash and Postmates.

 

The Chowbus platform focuses on meals rather than restaurants. While scrolling through the mobile app, a user is connected to various independent restaurants depending on what particular dish they’re seeking. Chowbus says only a small portion of the restaurants on its platform, 15 percent, are also available on Grubhub and Uber Eats. 

 

The app is currently available in Chicago, Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, Champaign, Ill. and Lansing, Mich. With the new investment, which brings Chowbus’ total raised to just over $5 million, the startup will launch in up to 20 additional markets. Eventually, Chowbus says it will expand into other cuisines, too, beginning with Mexican and Italian. 

 

Chowbus was founded in 2016 by chief executive officer Linxin Wen and chief technology officer Suyu Zhang.

[caltrek]

WHAT A PROJECT IN WISCONSIN CAN TEACH OTHERS ABOUT WORKING WITH FARMERS TO REDUCE PHOSPHORUS RUNOFF

 

https://ensia.com/fe...sphorus-runoff/

 

Introduction:

(Ensia) His office, in the tribe’s Little Bear Development Center about thirteen miles from Green Bay, Wisconsin, is decorated with aerial photos of streams and farm fields. A table holds vials of aquatic critters preserved in clear liquid, and his desk is stacked with binders detailing several stream restoration projects.

 

Why exactly does Green Bay need saving? Because it suffers from too much phosphorus, which contributes to Cyanobacteria, more commonly known as blue-green algae. Around the world, these bacteria are turning water a disgusting shade of green and other colors, and producing poisons that can sicken people and kill animals. And when the algae die off they can rob oxygen from other life in the water, killing fish and other aquatic life.

 

Around Green Bay, several small streams carry excess nutrients from farm fields into the bay and eventually into Lake Michigan. One of them, Silver Creek, is the focus of a pilot project designed to answer a crucial question: Can farmers reduce their pollution enough to help the bay, while remaining profitable? The project lies within the boundaries of the Oneida reservation, and more than half the land is owned by the tribe, which leases a lot of land to non-tribal growers.

 

“We require all our renters to follow best management practices, or BMPs, and we’re delighted to work with other partners to get more farmers on board,” Snitgen says.

Photo courtesy of NEW Water, the brand of the Green Bay Metropolitan Sewerage District

[caltrek]

Sencrop Is A Data Platform To Help Farmers Manage Their Lands

 

https://techcrunch.c...ge-their-lands/

 

Introduction:

(TechCrunch) Meet Sencrop a French startup that wants to empower farmers using sensors, a data platform and a service marketplace. The company recently raised a $10 million funding round.

 

The Series A round was led by Bpifrance with NCI Waterstart, Nord Capital and The Yield Lab also participating. Existing investors Demeter and Breega Capital also reinvested.

 

If you’re a farmer and are getting started when it comes to leveraging data, Sencrop wants to be a one-stop shop for all your digital needs. The company sells connected stations that can measure temperature, humidity, rainfall, windspeed, etc.

 

 

[caltrek]

Big farmers use climate-resistant seeds. Most small farmers can’t get them.

 

https://grist.org/ar...-cant-get-them/

 

Introduction:

(Grist) Half of all humans owe their lives to small farmers, because that’s who grows most of the food in Africa and Asia. But it turns out that small farmers in poorer countries are stuck with seeds that can’t cope with a rapidly changing climate.

 

It’s a different story here in North America. A farmer in Illinois facing drought can plant Pioneer’s AQUAmax corn, which provides solid yields in dry years. If damp weather is covering your peas in powdery mildew, you can get mildew-resistant seeds. Most small farmers, on the other hand, can’t get their hands on new seeds bred to tolerate droughts, floods, and pests.

 

For the past six years, the Dutch nonprofit Access to Seeds has been researching the $50-billion seed industry — companies like Monsanto-buyer Bayer, Syngenta, and Pioneer — to see if they are making the latest innovations available to small farmers. It released a report this week showing that the vast majority of the world’s farmers can’t get their hands on the same seeds that help wealthier farmers produce bountiful harvests.

 

Grist spoke to Ido Verhagen, executive director of the nonprofit, about why more small farmers are seeking out improved seeds, why no one wants to breed beans, and why he thinks we need agribusinesses to help fix the food system. (See linked article for interview).

[caltrek]

Together, more heat and more carbon dioxide may not alter quantity or nutritional quality of crops

 

https://theconversat...of-crops-110468

 

Introduction:

(The Conversation) Researchers around the world are trying to figure out ways to feed a growing population, which is estimated to reach nearly 10 billion by 2050. But as humanity struggles to increase crop yield, might nutritional quality of crops suffer?

 

It is difficult to predict how crops will respond to future environmental conditions. Growing plants in greenhouses or growth chambers allows researchers to create any environmental condition imaginable. But plants grown this way are like caged animals; how they behave in these enclosures may not be predictive of how they behave in the wild. This challenge can be overcome by coupling traditional farming with experimental techniques to simulate future growing conditions.

 

As plant biologists, we focus a lot of attention on understanding how crops respond to environmental changes and on determining the resulting composition of plant tissues. In our most recent study, the goal was to understand how future climate conditions like higher carbon dioxide levels and warmer temperatures affect the health and nutritional qualities of a major crop both in terms of how much can be harvested and how much the mineral nutrition changes – a sort of crop report for the future.

 

The impact of carbon dioxide concentration and temperature on crop yield and nutritional quality. 

Carl Bernacchi, CC BY-SA

[kjaggard]

Scientists Call for 'Global Agricultural Revolution' and 'Planetary Health Diet' to Save Lives—and Earth

 

https://www.commondr...diet-save-lives

 

Introduction:

(Common Dreams) While scientists continue to call for immediately phasing out fossil fuels across the global to avert climate catastrophe, a team of international experts on Thursday unveiled a proposal to address another major driver of the climate crisis: the world's unhealthy and unsustainable food system.

 

"The food we eat and how we produce it determines the health of people and the planet, and we are currently getting this seriously wrong," declaredTim Lang, a co-author of the EAT-Lancet Commission and professor at City, University of London. "We need a significant overhaul, changing the global food system on a scale not seen before in ways appropriate to each country's circumstances."

 

The commission brought together 37 experts in agriculture, environmental sustainability, human health, and political science from 16 countries. Over three years, they developed the "planetary health diet," which aims to address the global food system's devastating environmental impact as well as mass malnutrition.

 

Noting that more than 800 million people worldwide "have insufficient food, while many more consume an unhealthy diet that contributes to premature death and disease," co-lead commissioner Dr. Walter Willett of Harvard University said the "world's diets must change dramatically" to reverse the damage that's been done.

 

In a new report about human health and the environmental, experts call for people across the globe to follow a "flexitarian" or "planetary health" diet.

(Photo: The EAT-Lancet Commission)

the biggest users of crop land are grains, and they are also one of the biggest sources of unnesecary nutrition lacking calorie dense junk food. You can actually permaculture food for 4 on an acre relatively easily, you would just have to go grain free to do it... sooo, TaDa! switch to a grainfree diet of vegetables and meat from poultry and fish primarily and we can grow a holy hells worth more in less space with fewer fossil fuel based mechanisms needed.

[Alislaws]

 

 

 

That chart is just amazing! Don't worry everyone Global warming will be fine it will all balance out perfectly!

[caltrek]

SCIENTISTS AROUND THE WORLD ARE WORKING TO TURN AGRICULTURAL WASTE INTO FOOD, PACKAGING AND MORE
 

https://ensia.com/fe...cultural-waste/

 

Extract:

 

(Ensia) Take cacao, for example. For every pound of cacao beans — the part of the plant that ends up in your chocolate bar — farmers produce about 12 times as much biomass. Now, researchers in Colombia have created new products from this “waste” material, including beer, juice, desserts similar to pudding and also nutraceuticals.

 

Cristian Blanco-Tirado, a chemistry professor at the Industrial University of Santander in Bucaramanga, Colombia, leads the Nextcoa project, which has developed these products. Nextcoa also uses cacao beans and waste to produce 100 percent cacao chocolates that are less bitter than traditional all-cacao products.

 

Instead of using the cane sugar, milk and soy lecithin found in a typical chocolate bar, Blanco-Tirado says that the product uses sweeteners and emulsifiers derived from the cacao fruit, which used to be thrown away after the cacao beans were extracted and exported. Blanco-Tirado says he expects “Betul” brand chocolate to be commercially available in August 2019.

 

“Our Santander region in Colombia has traditionally been a producer of cacao beans, but only 6% of the revenues go to producers,” he says. “So we asked if it was possible to take better advantage of the cacao fruit by developing technology for the production, not only of beans, but of products with greater value.”

 

Blanco-Tirado says the biggest challenge is helping smallholder farmers understand the benefits of commercializing the waste, while also making the process financially viable and attracting investment.

[kjaggard]

one of the few social media adverts that actually matches me as a target came up the other day. I'm going to give them a try in a week or so to see if it works in this area and what I get for it.

 

http://www.misfitsmarket.com/

[ralfy]

Like the use of insects and others for food.

[caltrek]

Banana fungus puts Latin America on alert

 

https://science.scie...nt/365/6450/207

 

Summary:

 

(Science) In a long-feared development, an extremely damaging disease of bananas has apparently reached Latin America. Late last week, the Colombian Agricultural Institute in Bogotá officially acknowledged that four plantations in northern Colombia have been quarantined because of suspected infection with Fusarium wilt tropical race 4 (TR4), a fungus that kills plants by clogging their vascular system. Already widespread in Asia, the disease can eventually wipe out entire plantations. The finding has yet to be confirmed—results from genome sequencing are expected in early August—but already countries in the region are on high alert. A major outbreak of TR4 could ruin many farmers and drive up banana prices globally. New ways to battle the scourge are on the horizon, including transgenic bananas that can resist the fungus.

[caltrek]

With Petition to Congress, 100,000+ People Demand Green New Deal 'That Fixes Our Food System'

 

 

https://www.commondr...our-food-system

 

Introduction:

 

(Common Dreams) A coalition of environmental, farmworker, public health, and food safety advocacy groups on Thursday delivered to Congress a petition signed by more than 100,000 people which calls for a Green New Deal "that fixes our food system" to combat the climate crisis.

 

The petition echoes a letter that more than 300 organizations sent to federal lawmakers in April on behalf of their millions of members. The letter came about two months after Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) introduced the historic Green New Deal resolution supported by a growing grassroots movement and dozens of Democrats in Congress.

 

"Supporting family farms, achieving universal access to healthy foods, and investing in sustainable farming and land-use practices that increase soil health are critical components of any comprehensive Green New Deal," declares the new petition, which notes that in addition to being a top generator of jobs, the U.S. food and farming sector is also a top generator of planet-heating emissions.

 

"To reduce emissions and bolster our nation's resilience in the face of the climate crisis, we must enact policies that transform unsustainable industrial agriculture, reduce food sector consolidation, as well as empower farmers and ranchers to adopt organic and agroecological practices," the petition says. "These policies must support diversified and ecologically regenerative farming techniques that reduce greenhouse gases and other pollution, boost soil health, and sequester carbon in soil—enhancing local and regional food security, economic well-being, and biodiversity."

(Photo: TumblingRun/Flickr/cc)

[caltrek]

CRISPR conundrum: Strict European court ruling leaves food-testing labs without a plan

 

https://www.nature.c...586-019-02162-x

 

Introduction:

 

(Nature) A landmark European court ruling that made gene-edited crops subject to the same stringent regulations as other genetically modified organisms (GMOs) has created a conundrum for food-testing laboratories across Europe.

 

The ruling that the Court of Justice of the European Union (ECJ) delivered on 25 July 2018 requires these scattered laboratories — which already spot-check freighters and supermarkets for foods that contain unapproved GMOs — to look for gene-edited crops. But there is no easy way to do this. Gene edits often alter just a few DNA letters, whereas conventional genetic modifications often involve transplanting longer stretches of DNA from one species to another.

 

“Some of these [gene-editing] alterations are small enough that they are simply indistinguishable from naturally occurring organisms,” says Martin Wasmer, who studies the legal aspects of genome editing at the Leibniz University Hannover, Germany. “It will not be possible to enforce in those cases.”

 

The court’s decision startled and confused many plant scientists who expected that gene-edited crops would be exempt from EU regulations that govern older, genetically modified crops. The bloc’s strict regulatory approach also differs starkly from that of other agricultural powerhouses. In June, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced that it does not intend to regulate edited crops with mutations that could have occurred in nature. Brazil, Argentina and Australia have taken a similar tack.

Gene-edited lettuce developed by the biotechnology firm Intrexon resists browning.

Credit: Intrexon

[caltrek]

Giant freshwater fishes are in alarming decline

 

https://www.nature.c...586-019-02403-z

 

Introduction:

 

(Nature) Freshwater megafish — giants weighing more than 30 kilograms that can live for decades — declined by more than 94% between 1970 and 2012, according to a recent study1.

 

The findings, published on 8 August in the journal Global Change Biology, are part of an analysis that looked at the populations of enormous freshwater animals in the world’s rivers and lakes. The drop-off reflects a broader downward trend in the populations of freshwater megafauna — such as caimans and giant salamanders — around the world (see ‘Plunging populations’). The study authors estimate that the populations of big freshwater animals have fallen by 88%.

 

“It is sadly a very shocking result,” says Fengzhi He, a fish ecologist at Leibniz-Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries in Berlin and the lead study author. His team estimates that the megafauna populations that started dropping in the 1980s across swathes of Asia — including Cambodia, southern China, India and Afghanistan — have plummeted by 99%.

A fisherman on the Japurá River in Brazil hauls a freshwater megafish into a boat.

Pulsar Imagens/Alamy

[caltrek]

Eat less meat: UN climate change report calls for change to human diet

 

https://www.nature.c...586-019-02409-7

 

Introduction:

 

(Nature) Efforts to curb greenhouse gas-emissions and the impacts of global warming will fall significantly short without drastic changes in global land use, agriculture and human diets, leading researchers warn in a high-level report commissioned by the United Nations.

 

The special report on climate and land by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) describes plant-based diets as a major opportunity for mitigating and adapting to climate change ― and includes a policy recommendation to reduce meat consumption.

 

On 8 August, the IPCC released a summary of the report, which is designed to inform upcoming climate negotiations amidst the worsening global climate crisis. More than 100 experts compiled the report in recent months, around half of whom hail from developing countries.

 

“We don’t want to tell people what to eat,” says Hans-Otto Pörtner, an ecologist who co-chairs the IPCC’s working group on impacts, adaptation and vulnerability. “But it would indeed be beneficial, for both climate and human health, if people in many rich countries consumed less meat, and if politics would create appropriate incentives to that effect.”

 

Researchers also note the relevance of the report to tropical rainforests, where concerns are mounting about accelerating rates of deforestation. The Amazon rainforests is a huge carbon sink that acts to cool global temperature, but rates of deforestation are rising, in part due to the policies and actions of the government of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.