By Tara Lohan Warming temperatures on land and in the water are already forcing many species to seek out more hospitable environments. Atlantic mackerel are swimming farther north; mountain-dwelling pikas are moving upslope; some migratory birds are altering the timing of their flights. Numerous studies have tracked these shifting ranges, looked at the importance of […]
By Kelly Magyarics Growing up in a family of gardening enthusiasts, Tobin Shea recalls devouring the pages of seeds, flowers, fruits and vegetables every time his grandparents received a new issue of the Burpee seed catalog. “I was always fascinated with gardening and being able to enjoy the fruits of one’s labor,” said the bar […]
By Nancy Castaldo Wheat, maize, rice … repeat. Those three starchy plants provide about half of all the calories we consume. What’s more, of the 12,000 plant species that can be used for human food, only about 150 are cultivated. And that heavy reliance on a limited number of crops poses a serious risk when […]
In an another legal blow to Monsanto, India’s Supreme Court on Monday refused to stay the Delhi High Court’s ruling that the seed giant cannot claim patents for Bollgard and Bollgard II, its genetically modified cotton seeds, in the country. Monsanto’s chief technology officer Robert Fraley, who just announced that he and other top executives […]
Once the work of public researchers, plant breeding is now dominated by a handful of massive corporations, but there are still a variety of nonprofit organizations working to preserve biodiversity and ensure access to heirloom, open-pollinated seeds for generations to come. Here is a roundup of our favorites, including a few that sell seeds in […]
The Svalbard Global Seed Vault in the Arctic Circle—also known as the “doomsday vault” safeguarding the world’s most diverse collection of seeds—now holds 1,059,646 unique crop varieties after receiving more than 70,000 samples on Monday. Depositors from 23 seed banks around the world braved sub-zero temperatures to deliver duplicate seeds of vital staples such as […]
A major seed deposit critical to ensuring global food security was made to the Svalbard Global Seed Vault in the Arctic Circle on Wednesday. Despite a backdrop of geopolitical volatility, nearly 50,000 samples of seeds from seed collections in Benin, India, Pakistan, Lebanon, Morocco, the Netherlands, the U.S, Mexico, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Belarus and the […]
Several U.S. state attorneys general will reportedly join the federal antitrust investigations of the pending multibillion dollar deals between DuPont and Dow Chemical Co and Bayer AG and Monsanto Co, respectively. An online petition to EU Commissioner for Competition: Margrethe Vestager, and Head of the antitrust Authority in the U.S. Department of Justice to block […]
ETC Group From the United Nations (U.N.) Rio+20 preparatory meetings in New York, ETC Group launched Who Will Control the Green Economy? The 60-page report connects the dots between the climate and oil crises, new technologies and corporate power. The report warns that the world’s largest companies are riding the coattails of the “Green Economy” […]
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