Climate change – the influence on food security
“When it rains, it does not rain on one roof only” This is a saying from the home village in western Kenya of my friend and colleague Dennis Rangi, CABI’s Executive Director for International Development. He said this in his introduction to the CABI Summit in London which I though was particularly apt as I…
Raisin questions.
Recently I read in an abstract in the CAB Abstracts Database that “Dog poisoning caused by grape or raisin consumption has been increasing recently. The first cases of poisoning were documented around 1989, several tens cases have been registered yearly in the world since 2003”. The author writing in a Czech veterinary journal is correct…
Better farm productivity is not enough – We need to “talk more about losing less”
If humanity is to continue to avert disaster and the Malthusian nightmare as growing populations exert ever increasing pressures on scarce earth resources, then we need some new solutions to old problems in agriculture, and we need to use some of the old solutions a lot better. In particular we need to recognise that we…
Food Security – helping to achieve MDG1: Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger
Representatives from more than 40 countries have gathered today to attend a day of presentations and debate. In a highly stimulating first session, a number of global thought leaders gave their views on food security into the future: can this be achieved and if so how? CABI's Executive Director for International Development, Dr Dennis Rangi,…
Wallingford’s Part in the Revolution
If you walk just for a few minutes up the river from CABI’s headquarters near Wallingford, UK, you come across Jethro Tull Gardens. For people of a certain age this causes some confusion – why should the council have seen fit to commemorate Ian Anderson’s prog rock band with a street name? A little further…
Rapid Diagnostic Tools – the End of Traditional Microscopic Diagnosis of Malaria?
Fig. 258. Plasmodium ovale. Three typical trophozoites that make species diagnosis very easyImage courtesy of the authors of Atlas of Human Malaria. From Zeno Bisoffi and Giovanni Swierczynski, of the Centre for Tropical Diseases, S. Cuore Hospital, in Negrar (Verona), Italy. At the recent ECTMIH 2009 in Verona, Italy, a very well attended parallel session…
Slow progress in tackling world hunger
The Global Hunger Index (GHI) Report released for World Food Day today shows that progress in fighting hunger remains slow. This year the report released by the International Food Policy Research Institute highlights gender inequality as a factor in food insecurity.
World Rural Women’s Day – 15th October
(Credit: Paul Jeffrey/UMCOR) Did you know… Women make up 51% of the agricultural labour force worldwide. A study of the household division of labour in Bangladeshi villages found that women worked almost 12 hours a day – compared with the eight to ten hours a day worked by men in the same villages. In many…
Pass the Chalice?
"Bishops defying swine flu advice" said the headlines recently. Some bishops in England have recently reinstated using a shared chalice to distribute communion wine. UK Dept of Health advice is to suspend this practice during the swine flu outbreak to prevent the spread of this disease. I can see why chalices were identified as potentially…
The World’s Happiest City is even happier now – Rio will host the 2016 Olympic Games
Photo credit: oglobo.com A week ago, Brazilians were celebrating, after the International Olympic Committee (IOC) announced, in Copenhagen, that Rio de Janeiro was chosen as the city to host the 2016 Olympic Games, beating Chicago, Tokyo and Madrid. The Brazilian President Lula cried with emotion, as he heard the news, and so did many Brazilians…