‘Switching’ onto ICT approaches to gender in extension services
Duncan Sones, of the Africa Soil Health Consortium (ASHC) delivery team, looks back on six years of concept and project development that could unlock changes in farmer’s ability to effectively access improved technologies… I don’t know about you but when I hear about something for the first time, I rarely take in all the nuanced…
Capitalising on Africa’s agriculture to achieve ‘zero hunger’
CABI board member Professor Ruth Oniang'o talks about winning the 2017 Africa Food Prize and how CABI is working towards helping to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goal 2: Zero Hunger.
Low salt diets could allow iodine-deficiency diseases to re-emerge
Salt has been used for thousands of years to flavor & preserve food BUT reliance on fast food, biscuits and tinned goods, with their hidden salt content, has created for us a high salt diet and with it an alarming rise in cardiovascular disease. Reducing our salt intake, by working with food industry and educating…
Is ‘more efficient’ food production a threat to animal welfare?
Ahead of the upcoming Biodiversity Institute Conference, Marian Stamp Dawkins, Professor of Animal Behaviour at the University of Oxford, highlights the pioneering work of two women who spoke out about the negative effects on animals of greater efficiency in food production. ‘Greater efficiency’ may for some people be an obvious goal for producing sustainable food…
Jumping the red light – Do consumers pay attention to nutritional labels?
There have been many labelling schemes to make clearer to consumers the healthiness of foods, such as traffic light codes with green for healthy and red for less healthy. But do consumers actually make use of the labels and choose healthier foods?In a paper in CAB Reviews, Sophie Hieke and Jo Wills of the European…
Can Haiti’s struggling agro-economy recover?
The earthquake that hit Haiti may have killed as many as 200,000, and delivering food to survivors is proving very difficult. However, Haiti was already suffering from major problems in trying to feed itself well before the earthquake struck, as detailed in many papers on CAB Abstracts. Haiti has a notable problem of food security, write…
NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!
The sound of despondent Handpicked bloggers rang through the air at CABI this morning. The corridors were reverberating in despair at the New Zealand Herald‘s frightening headline ‘Climate change could see pubs run dry‘. Streuth! Pedants among you who have checked the link will have noted that the story appeared in last week’s Herald, but…
‘Eat food. Mostly plants. Not too much’
This is essentially what a hundred years of nutritional science; and 610,000 records on CAB Abstracts boil down to, according to journalist and author, Michael Pollan, in his latest book, In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto. While I by no means agree with everything that he says in this interview with Terrence McNally on…
Nutrigenomics On The Menu In Paris
Ahhh, Paris! City of food and fashion…But the latest trend to hit the food industry is certainly no fad. Personalised nutrition is the ‘new black’ in the world of food. No longer do we need to embarrass ourselves by appearing at the supermarket with a trolley full of identical shopping to our neighbour. Whether or…
‘Nano Inside’
Two words that are unlikely to appear in a supermarket near you any time soon. But not because nanotechnology has no application in food – far from it! The reason that the food industry is unlikely to be advertising the widespread applications of nanotechnology, according to Dr. Frans Kampers, of Wageningen University in the Netherlands,…