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A unique confluence of archeology, molecular genetics and serendipity guided a collaboration of Mexican and Penn State researchers to a deeper understanding of how modern corn was domesticated from teosinte, a perennial grass native to Mexico and Central America, more than 5,000 years ago.There is much interest in how ancient agriculturists transformed the wild grass teosinte into modern corn, one of the most important and successful crops on earth, according to team leader Jonathan Lynch, distinguished professor of plant nutrition. For decades, his research group in the College of Agricultural Sciences has been uncovering how roots play a critical role...

Across the world, top wheat-producing regions are experiencing adverse weather conditions that could threaten production. In places like Ukraine, a military invasion by Russia has slashed production significantly. All of this suggests the world is on the cusp of a food crisis. Droughts, floods, and heatwaves have plagued farmland in the U.S., Europe, India, and China. As for Ukraine, the world’s largest wheat producer, the war could slash production by upwards of a third. There’s one exception: Russia, which is expected to have a bumper crop as wheat prices soar. “If there was ever a year where we needed to...

Ukraine’s foreign minister said Thursday that everyone involved in the transportation and sales of grain seized by Russia in occupied areas of the country will face legal consequences. “Russia is a criminal three times over: it bombed Syria to ruins, occupied part of Ukraine, and is now selling stolen Ukrainian grain to Syria,” the ministry’s press service cited Dmytro Kuleba as saying. “I want to remind the participants in this deal: what is stolen has never brought happiness to anyone. Everyone involved in the sale, transportation or purchase of stolen grain is an accomplice to the crime,” Kuleba said. “Your...

A representative of the United Nations World Food Program warned on Sunday that Russia is blocking close to 4.5 million tons in grain exports from Ukraine, The Guardian reported. Martin Frick told German news outlet dpa that the abrupt stoppage could initiate a global food crisis and that he is working to allow the supply to go forward. “Foodstuffs have to reach those in Ukraine who are trapped and in need. But at the same time, there is the need to provide other parts of the world with foodstuffs they are expecting from Ukraine in order to alleviate a global...

Today’s Situation Update podcast (see below) reveals worrisome new intel that describes Joe Biden’s “controlled demolition” of the US food supply as a means to deliberately cause food scarcity, panic and chaos nationwide. US rail carriers, we have learned, are right now declaring force majeure and cancelling contracts on their obligations to deliver hundreds of thousands of rail cars of bulk grains to cattle and dairy operations in America. Right now, tens of thousands of dairy animals face starvation within weeks, and grain supplies will be gone in many areas in just a few days. Importantly, if dairy animals are...

Please use the sharing tools found via the share button at the top or side of articles. Copying articles to share with others is a breach of FT.com T&Cs and Copyright Policy. Email licensing@ft.com to buy additional rights. Subscribers may share up to 10 or 20 articles per month using the gift article service. More information can be found at https://www.ft.com/tour. https://www.ft.com/content/51d767dd-6088-4aad-8d63-ff9179559118 We know that the war in Ukraine has led to sharp increases in prices for both food and fuel. This in turn has sparked concern that we may see a repeat of the famine and food riots that...

CHICAGO (Reuters) - After Russia's invasion of Ukraine sent global wheat futures soaring, U.S. farmer Vance Ehmke was eager to sell his grain. Local prices shot up roughly 30% to nearly $12 a bushel, about the highest Ehmke could recall in 45 years of farming near the western Kansas town of Healy. Instead of reaping a windfall, Ehmke found a commodities market turned upside down. He and his wife Louise told Reuters they couldn't sell a nickel of their upcoming summer wheat harvest for future delivery. Futures prices for corn and wheat had rocketed so abruptly that many along the...

The Russian invasion of Ukraine has laid bare the world’s dependence on Russian President Vladimir Putin and its neighbor now under siege, including the fact that the two countries supply much of the grain needs around the globe and prices for grain are now the highest they have been in six decades. Russia and Ukraine provide 29 percent of global wheat exports, 19 percent of global corn supplies, and 80 percent of the global sunflower oil exports

Ukraine war 'catastrophic for global food' By Emma Simpson Business correspondent, BBC News The boss of one of the world's biggest fertiliser companies has said the war in Ukraine will deliver a shock to the global supply and cost of food. Yara International, which operates in more than 60 countries, buys considerable amounts of essential raw materials from Russia. Fertiliser prices were already high due to soaring wholesale gas prices. Yara's boss, Svein Tore Holsether, has warned the situation could get even tougher. "Things are changing by the hour," he told the BBC.

About two and a half years ago, we told readers China was panic hoarding food, which was several months before the virus pandemic began to spread worldwide; Beijing has managed to stockpile more than half of the world's maize and other grains that have resulted in rapid food inflation and triggered famine in some countries. In August 2019, we asked the question: Does China believe that we are on the verge of a major global crisis? The communist Chinese government has always been very big into planning, and it appears that they have decided that now is the time to...

DALIAN, China/TOKYO -- Less than 20% of the world's population has managed to stockpile more than half of the globe's maize and other grains, leading to steep price increases across the planet and dropping more countries into famine. The hoarding is taking place in China. COFCO Group, a major Chinese state-owned food processor, runs one of China's largest food stockpiling bases, at the port of Dalian, in the northeastern part of the country. It stores beans and grains gathered from home and abroad in 310 huge silos. From there, the calories make their way throughout China via rail and sea....

Micro-sized cameras have great potential to spot problems in the human body and enable sensing for super-small robots, but past approaches captured fuzzy, distorted images with limited fields of view.Now, researchers at Princeton University and the University of Washington have overcome these obstacles with an ultracompact camera the size of a coarse grain of salt. The new system can produce crisp, full-color images on par with a conventional compound camera lens 500,000 times larger in volume, the researchers reported in a paper published Nov. 29 in Nature Communications.Enabled by a joint design of the camera’s hardware and computational processing, the...

China's decisions around its agricultural policy are becoming increasingly murky with news of arrests, secrecy, and claims of cover-ups. Key points: A Chinese grains analyst has reportedly been jailed and another is said to be under house arrest Australian grains analysts say China is suppressing information about grain shortages to keep world prices down China is buying up near-record amounts of grain while reporting a bumper crop of its own Independent analysts who report on China's grains industry have reportedly been arrested and their online businesses shut down to stop them from telling the truth about the country's below-average crop....

Not just metals, hierarchical societies and fortified settlements: a new food also influenced economic transformations in the Bronze Age around 3,500 years ago. This is evidenced by frequent archeological discoveries of remains of broomcorn millet (Panicum miliaceum L.), a cereal with small, roundish grains. A major study by the Collaborative Research Center 1266 at Kiel University (CAU) was published yesterday (13 August) in the journal Scientific Reports. It shows how common millet got onto the menu in Bronze Age Europe. Intensive trade and communication networks facilitated the incredibly rapid spread of this new crop originating from the Far East. "Wheat,...

China slapped an import ban on four Australian abattoirs Tuesday in an escalation of Beijing’s warning of a consumer boycott in retaliation for Canberra’s push for an independent coronavirus probe. The beef ban comes just days after China flagged plans to slap an 80 percent tariff on Australian barley, bringing the trade to its knees. Analysts said the move raised concerns of a possible standoff between Australia and its most important trading partner that could spill over into other crucial sectors as the world struggles to navigate the disease-induced economic crisis. The Financial Times reports China is Australia’s largest trade...

IDAHO FALLS — Local miller Jeremiah Clark plans to soon expand into a new Idaho Falls facility with the capacity to process up to 5 percent of the world’s quinoa supply. Clark, owner of American Mills, LLC, contracts with 17 growers from American Falls through Ashton to raise his own proprietary variety of the nutrient-rich, pseudo-cereal crop. His quinoa fields range in size from 100 to 200 acres, and he’s already made Eastern Idaho the largest quinoa production region in North America. He hopes to have equipment installed by the end of October to commence operations at his new quinoa...

One of two ways that Pacific Northwest farmers get their wheat to export in Portland has been shut down after the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers stopped barge traffic on the Columbia River around the Bonneville Dam after a crack was found on a critical part of one of its massive locks. With the navigation lock inoperable, barges can’t push upstream from Bonneville Dam, which is about 40 miles upstream from Portland. The broken lock is also preventing barges hauling wheat, logs and other freight from Idaho, Oregon and Washington from reaching port. The crack was discovered late last week,...

In a land flowing with milk and honey, what kinds of food made up the ancient Jewish diet? What did people eat and drink in Roman Palestine? Susan Weingarten guides readers through a menu of the first millennium C.E. in her article "Biblical Archaeology 101: The Ancient Diet of Roman Palestine," published in the March/April 2019 issue of Biblical Archaeology Review. Although it is difficult to reconstruct the diet of the average person in Palestine during the Roman and Late Antique periods, Weingarten, as both a food historian and an archaeologist, is well equipped for the task. Using archaeological remains...

One Supreme Court case stands behind the Fair Labor Standards Act, the Controlled Substances Act, the Endangered Species Act and the Civil Rights Act. It's been cited in rulings involving hot-button issues such as health care reform and medical marijuana. But chances are you've never heard of it. Despite its wide-reaching influence, hardly anyone outside of legal circles is aware of the 1942 case, Wickard v. Filburn. One man, Gary Marbut of Missoula, Mont., hopes to change that. If Marbut succeeds, we'll also hear about another Supreme Court case: the one that overturns Wickard. ... snip ... The case was...

A scientist from China has been sentenced to 10 years in prison in the United States for stealing seeds of genetically modified American rice, the Department of Justice announced Wednesday. The Chinese scientist, Weiqiang Zhang, 51, was a legal permanent resident living in Manhattan, Kansas. He was working as a rice breeder at Ventria Bioscience, a biopharmaceutical company that creates genetically modified rice. He stole hundreds of rice seeds from the company that had cost millions of dollars and taken years of research to develop, according to the Justice Department. He kept the seeds in his home.