Month: July 2018

We live in an exciting time in agriculture. Not only is technology advancing rapidly, but the understanding and comprehension of technology and data is becoming easier to decode and decipher. By 2050, the population of Earth will amass 9.7 billion people, each with needs of food and water. Throughout time, revolutions have changed the way… Continue reading Agriculture’s next breakthrough: New technologies are driving efficiency, data insights

IMAGE: THE HIGHLY COMPLEX SUGARCANE GENOME HAS FINALLY BEEN SEQUENCED. CIRAD and its partners* had to use cunning to establish the first sugarcane reference sequence. The plant’s genome is so complex that conventional sequencing techniques had proved useless. This meant that sugarcane was the last major cultivated plant to have its genome sequenced. A novel… Continue reading The highly complex sugarcane genome has finally been sequenced

A team of Cornell and Japanese researchers has discovered a new genetic mechanism that allows certain rice plants to survive monthslong floods. When the plant becomes submerged, a rare form of a gene triggers rapid growth to keep shoots above rising water. In a study published July 13 in Science, the team identified a rare… Continue reading Rice survives long-term floods due to newly discovered genetic mechanism

“Every time that rains soup it catch us with the fork in the hands”, says Javier Bujan, manager at Kimei, a grain commerce house based at Buenos Aires. Mr. Bujan its refers to the commercial war between China and the United States, that had derived in the imposing of a 25% import tax to the… Continue reading Sorry, but China-US trade war has no impact for Argentinean soybean farmers

With 96 per cent of China’s villages connected to the Internet and each rural household having on an average three mobile phones, the sickle and hoe have been replaced by the smarphones and apps as the country’s emblematic farming tools. In east China’s Jiangxi province, smart greenhouses with watering and fertilising controlled via mobile phone… Continue reading Smartphones emerging as main farming tools in China

When Monsanto shelved its commercial GM wheat trials in 2004, many people thought the experiment was over, but other companies carried out their own tests in later years. Photo: Thinkstock There might not be any commercial GM wheat in production in Canada — but most years there are at least some field trials. The Canadian… Continue reading GM wheat field tests continue in Canada

Wheat ranks third among U.S. field crops in planted acreage, production, and gross farm receipts, behind corn and soybeans. Production has, however, dropped off over the past decade. USDA estimates U.S. farmers planted 46 million acres to wheat for the 2017-2018 growing season, down from 50 million in 2016-2017 and over 63 million in 2008.… Continue reading Why wheat yield gains continue to lag behind corn, soybeans

The Philippine Center for PostHarvest Mechanization and Development (PhilMech) in partnership with  a farmer-organization in Murcia, Negros Occidental recently launched their project “Brown Rice Processing Impeller Technology” at the Philippine Rice Research Institute (PhilRice) in Murcia, Negros. Prior to the launching, PhilMech conducted a two-day business planning workshop with RiceBIS farmers. The discussion covered managerial,… Continue reading PhilRice, PhilMech launch new brown rice technology in Negros

Wheat researchers have discovered a combination of genes that provide resistance to the significant fungal disease Stagonospora nodorum blotch (SNB) in Western Australian varieties. The discovery was made as part of a research project by the Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development and the State Agricultural Biotechnology Centre at Murdoch University, with funding from… Continue reading Genetic resistance to wheat fungal disease identified

Approval has been confirmed for British producers to export potatoes to Kenya, where the crop is the second most important after maize. Ten potato varieties were trialled at three separate farms over two seasons with free variety Cara, and two James Hutton Ltd varieties, Gemson and Lady Balfour, making the grade. In the trials Cara… Continue reading British seed potato varieties approved for export to Kenya