What’s in your noodle soup?

by Georgina Smith | Dec 9, 2015

You may never have heard of it before. A globetrotting crop by all accounts, it’s thought to have been introduced into Southeast Asia in the Philippines from Mexico in the 19th Century. As our diet becomes ever more complex, cassava – or tapioca – a...

Genome Editing: As Easy, Useful, and Safe as it Sounds?

by Nathan Russell | Dec 1, 2015

Helping experts in crop biotechnology explain their work to non-specialists is a tough job – one to which I’ve dedicated a lot of time as a science writer/editor over the last 20 years. One rhetorical device that I’ve always found handy for getting my mind around...

Climate change: Arabica coffee faces a roasting

by Neil Palmer | Oct 27, 2015

Scientists pinpoint the world’s most vulnerable coffee zones New research gives fresh insights into which of the world’s arabica coffee-producing zones will bear the brunt of climate change. The biggest losers will be in hotter areas with long dry seasons, such as...

EATxCali: Hungry for a Sustainable Food System

by Neil Palmer | Oct 26, 2015

When I grew up, poor people were thin. Books, films and news coverage of famines perpetuated the stereotype. But today, poor people are increasingly likely to be overweight. Now it’s often the rich who are the thin ones. It’s especially the case in cities, where...

Impatient with Hunger

by Ruben G. Echeverría | Oct 13, 2015

In adopting the sustainable development goals (SDGs) at the United Nations summit held last month in New York City, world leaders made it very clear what agricultural research must accomplish in the years to come. By 2030, this research must, among other things, help...

Colombian coffee: Storming the taste test

by Neil Palmer | Oct 8, 2015

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