Using translational research to enhance farmers’ voice: a case study of the potential introduction of GM cassava in Kenya’s coast

Genetically modified (GM) cassava is currently being developed to address problems of diseases that threaten the food security of farmers in developing countries. The technologies are aimed at smallholder farmers, in hopes of reducing the vulnerability of cassava production to these diseases. In this paper we examine barriers to farmers’ voice in the development of GM cassava. We also examine the role of a translational research process to enhance farmers’ voice, to understand the sources of vulnerability farmers in a group in Kenya’s Coast face, and to determine if their concerns are consistent with those of the scientists in agriculture addressing farmers’ needs. A two-way communication participatory process provided insights into the complex vulnerability context of farmers, their primary concerns with processing and markets of cassava in order to improve livelihoods, the lack of networks with two way communication flows, and the lack of information on GM technologies. The translational research engaged farmers and scientists in an iterative process where scientists are learning what farmers need, and farmers are learning about the potential benefits and risks from GM technologies, while at the same time expressing their concerns.     

Challenging the developmental state: Nature conservation in Singapore

Abstract: Nature conservation efforts are often reactive to encroaching development plans and systematic conservation planning that is integral with development is not only uncommon, but is often fraught with difficulties even where it is actually attempted. Such obstacles to conservation are especially apparent in developmental states where state legitimacy is largely derived from the state's ability to develop the country. Among other things, developmental states place a premium on physical and economic development. This paper critiques, through the standpoint of nature conservation, the inadequate conceptualisation of ‘development’ in the developmental state thesis. Specifically, this paper argues that the seemingly value‐free (but ultimately economically based) underpinnings of development goals pushed by the developmental state needs to be tempered with a broader concern for the ethics of development. To that end, I draw on two case studies of nature conservation tussles in Singapore to show how alternative extra‐economic visions of development have been articulated, notwithstanding the developmental state's monopoly on the discourse (and practice) of progress and development. The case studies, set in the heady economic growth of the early 1990s, will critique two related aspects of the developmental state: its ‘amoral’ economistic conception of development and its use of growth and materialism as legitimacy.     

The nature and inheritance of sweetness and acidity in the cultivated apple

Summary A survey was made of the sweetness and sourness of the fruits of apple cultivars. Measurements of the concentration of sugars and malic acid in ripe fruits were made and the variation between samples of a cultivar, between cultivars, between years and between cultivars and their tetraploid and colour sports was studied and showed a wide range of variation between cultivars but fairly constant values within cultivars.The study of a number of progenies shows that sweetness and sourness are inherited independently. Sweetness shows a quantitative pattern of inheritance and the progeny mean approximates the mid-parent value. Sourness is controlled by a single gene, with medium and high acidity being dominant to very low, superimposed on a quantitative pattern.The mean sugar and acid concentrations of a progeny and the approximate range of variation can be predicted from the sugar and acid concentrations found in the parents.     

Polychlorobiphenyls in North Atlantic ocean water

Concentrations of polychlorobiphenyls (PCB's) have been measured at the surface and at various depths in the water of the North Atlantic Ocean between 26 degrees N and 63 degrees N. The concentrations average about 20 parts per trillion and amount to an estimated 2 x 10(4) metric tons of PCB's in the upper 200 meters of water. The average concentrations of PCB's in the surface water of the Sargasso Sea are lower than those in the northern North Atlantic.