News

Genebanks are generally safe. But they are not invulnerable.

More than a decade ago, the International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas’ (ICARDA) genebank got caught up in the civil war in Syria, and scientists...

Berlin, Germany, 15 November 2023: Leading experts have issued a rallying cry that greater international cooperation is urgently required to safeguard food security in the wake of global crises.

This call to action from...

“You’ve got to think about doing big things while you’re doing small things, so that all the small things go in the right direction.”

The words of U.S. futurist writer Alvin Toffler in the 1970s are sometimes cited in business...

On 19 September, scientists, policymakers and other crop diversity enthusiasts, flocked to Mindspace in Williamsburg, one of Brooklyn’s foodiest neighborhoods, to address one of the most pressing challenges of our time—how to...

The people of rural India love their bajra chapatis. These flatbreads made of pearl millet flour are a highly nutritious staple in the diet of millions of Indians. And farmers love pearl millet because it will grow where other...

Crop diversity is under threat. Changes in land use, extreme weather events, shifting pests and diseases, even human conflict and strife, all mean that we cannot take the future existence of this diversity for granted.

But what...

From Lima to Lusaka, open the menu of one of the fancier burger joints and you may well find fries made from sweetpotatoes rather than the more common, blander sort of tuber. The value chain that ensures that this delicious snack...

The peanut (Arachis hypogaea L.), also known as groundnut, is native to South America but is now grown throughout the tropics and subtropics. There, this delicious legume is a subsistence crop for many, as well as an important...

The importance of our planet's biodiversity – and its crop diversity – has never been more clear.

This past year has shown time and again the urgency of both conserving crop diversity and using it to develop climate-resilient...

Crop diversity – without which we cannot adapt to the climate crisis, improve livelihoods and feed everyone adequately – was highlighted at the recent Global Landscapes Forum’s (GLF) Climate event. What can we do to protect it?

R...