Enlarge image The diversity of coconut trees like these planted along the beach in the northern Philippines is in danger, but a French scientist has a plan.
The diversity of coconut trees like these planted along the beach in the northern Philippines is in danger, but a French scientist has a plan.
French adventurer-scientist Roland Bourdeix has a grand, almost surreal, vision for how to preserve a thousand or more genetic varieties of coconut trees. Imagine, as he does, turning dozens or hundreds of remote Pacific islands into coconut sanctuaries. Each island would contain just a few varieties of these trees. No others would be allowed, because the whole point of this exercise is to prevent uncontrolled mixing of genes from different varieties.
But why? Are coconut trees, the source of oil and newly trendy coconut water, somehow in danger?
Not exactly. At least not for now. There are plenty of coconut palms all over the tropics, and coconut production has been slowly growing.
But that masks a potential long-term problem, says Stephan Weise, Deputy Director General for Research at Bioversity International in Rome. Most coconut production comes from a small slice of the coconut's gene pool. Producers rely on a handful of high-producing varieties or hybrids.
Those commercial varieties are slowly overwhelming traditional varieties that people in the tropics have tended for thousands of years. Those traditional strains of coconut are the storehouse of the coconut's genetic diversity: All of the colors, shapes, tastes, and survival tools that this species possesses and may need again someday.
Conserving such diversity in agricultural crops is a familiar problem. Whether it's rice or cucumbers, farmers around the world have been replacing traditional "landraces" with a small number of high-yielding varieties created by plant breeders.
But the situation with coconuts has an additional twist, Weise says.
First of all, scientists can't yet preserve a particular line of coconuts in refrigerated "gene banks," as they do with standard seeds. They can't dry, freeze, and preserve coconuts for decades, as they can with corn kernels. Instead, coconuts have to be preserved as living trees, growing outside.
This leads to the second problem. Coconut varieties growing in the open air often won't reproduce themselves reliably. Their flowers pick up pollen from other trees nearby, which often turn out to be commercial varieties or hybrids. And when that happens, their genetic identity is "diluted." Their offspring won't contain their particular combination of genes. Some genes may be lost altogether.
So what's the secret to preserving these heirloom coconuts? For starters, scientists have set up a dozen open-air coconut gene banks. They're reproducing each variety through careful hand-pollination of the trees. But Weise says that's expensive and labor-intensive, especially when trees get tall, with flowers beyond the reach of ladders. (There's also the threat of disease; a coconut collection in Papua New Guinea is under quarantine right now because of an outbreak of disease nearby.)
Which brings us back to Roland Bourdeix's crazy-sounding idea. Bourdeix is a scientist at CIRAD, a French research institute on agricultural development, and he's one of the world's leading experts on coconuts. The key to preserving coconut biodiversity more cheaply, he thinks, is isolation. And there's no more isolated place than a lonely Pacific island. Just convince people on one of these islands to plant coconut trees from a single variety (or a handful of distinctly different varieties), and the problem, at least for that small corner of the coconut's gene pool, is practically solved.
So Bourdeix is now scouting the Pacific for such islands. He's found several where the inhabitants are willing to help turn his vision into reality. One of them is well-known already: The Tetiaroa Atoll in French Polynesia, an idyllic retreat once owned by Marlon Brando.
Topic Galleries -- South Florida Sun-Sentinel.com Topic galleries provide easy access to stories and photos about people, places, organizations, events and subjects of interest to you. They bring together rich ... What else has been happening this week - Cook Islands News - Index General News. Week ending Wednesday, 15 August, 2012. Current events and entertainment in Rarotonga and the Cook Islands. Maldives - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Maldives, officially the Republic of Maldives and also referred to as the Maldive Islands, is an island nation in the Indian Ocean consisting of a double chain of ... Pwo Ceremony on Satawal, March 15-20 2007 K Holo Mau: 2007 Voyage for Mau Introduction: K Holo Mau, 2007 Voyage for Mau (January 23-April 12) Voyage Preparation (December 8-January 23) Pacific 'Large Ocean Island States' Conserve Huge Marine Areas ... RAROTONGA, Cook Islands, September 3, 2012 (ENS) Two enormous new marine protected areas in the Pacific Ocean have been designated by two of the worlds ... Cayman Islands Real Estate Blog No. 1 Cayman Islands Theres no income or payroll tax, summer all-year-round, hardly any crime, and no pollution, notes happy Scottish expat Steve McIntosh. Virgin Islands Agriculture and Food Fair ... Front Cover : Table of Contents : 1987 agriculture and food fair... Governor Alexander A. Farrelly's... Dr. Arthur A. Richards' messag... Acting commissioner Eric L ... International News World News - ABC News Get the latest international news and events from Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and more. See world news photos and videos at ABCNews Virgin Islands Pocket Adventures - 2fishygirl on Scribd Scribd Virgin Islands Pocket Adventures - ebook download as or read book online. Travel to grow, expand your horizons beyond what you thought possible our Adventure ... Frommer's 500 Extraordinary Islands - 2fishygirl on Scribd Scribd Frommer's 500 Extraordinary Islands - Read book online. Escape to the World's Most Spectacular IslandsThis guidebook leads you on an irresistible tour of some of the ...
No comments:
Post a Comment