Agricultural Biodiversity Weblog
Agrobiodiversity is crops, livestock, foodways, microbes, pollinators, wild relatives …
Darrell Rankin reminisces about Erna Bennett: She told me about flying unarmed bombers from the U.S. to Britain, how her facility with languages led to her recruitment to the intelligence services, how she was parachuted into Greece, about her capture and liberation from Gestapo custody, how the British took Greece over after the war (the …
There’s an obituary of Erna Bennett by Peter Hanelt, Helmut Knüpffer and Karl Hammer of the Leibniz Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research (IPK), Gatersleben, Germany in the latest Genetic Resources and Crop Evolution. It reveals a side of Erna that was new to me: In Erna’s own words, her life was devoted …
GRAIN found and shared a 1986 Canadian documentary that includes interviews with Erna Bennett. “Critical minds and ‘vegetal life’.” Plants and philosophy. Wacky, yes. But perhaps of interest. Are you near Port Townsend, WA? Go hear a lecture on “Farming with Nature: Agroecology for the Olympic Peninsula” on Monday at 7.30. While the EU potentially …
Policy wonks start to worry about the next US Farm Bill and its effects on poor farmers elsewhere. Poles start to worry about their endangered chicks. The Youth in Agriculture gives agricultural biodiversity some love on St Valentine’s Day. “Can jowar ever replace rice?” Question expecting the answer no? (Jowar is sorghum.) Can anyone actually …
Thanks to Helmut Knüpffer for sending in a scan of the Plant Introduction Newsletter No. 22 (July 1969), featuring a short report about the “FAO Panel of Experts on Plant Exploration and Introduction”. This includes a photograph of the eminent participants, one of whom is Erna Bennett (top left), who died a few weeks back.