The importance and challenges of crop germplasm interdependence: the case of Bhutan

An analysis of food crop germplasm flows into and out of Bhutan was carried out to determine the extent of reliance of Bhutanese agriculture on introduced germplasm. Methods used included literature review, key informant interviews, field visits and crop pedigree analysis. Bhutan has been introducing foreign germplasm since the 1960s. By December 2015, about 300 varieties of 46 food crops including several non-traditional crops were introduced. Germplasm sources include CGIAR centres such as IRRI, CIMMYT, ICARDA, and AVRDC and countries such as Bangladesh, India, Japan, Korea, Nepal, and Thailand. Pedigree analysis of rice varieties indicated that 74% of the released varieties originated in other countries. Using imported germplasm, Bhutan has formally released over 180 varieties of cereals, fruits and vegetables. Initially, the germplasm flow was largely unregulated, but the country has been developing formal exchange mechanisms with the creation of the National Biodiversity Centre (NBC) in 1995. Findings point to a strong reliance on external germplasm for the country’s major food crops. International germplasm exchanges will remain important to deal with new environmental and climatic conditions and given the limited national plant breeding capacity. National agricultural policy should give higher priority to collaborative development of new crops in the Himalayan region and beyond

Access to and benefit sharing of plant genetic resources: novel field experiences to inform policy

A number of national and international policy processes are underway to allow for the development of sui generis systems to protect local natural and genetic resources and related knowledge about their management, use and maintenance. Despite agreements reached on paper at international and national levels, such as the Nagoya Protocol on access to genetic resources and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits derived from their use, and the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, progress in implementation has been slow and in many countries, painful. Promising examples from the field could stimulate policy debates and inspire implementation processes. Case studies from China, Cuba, Honduras, Jordan, Nepal, Peru and Syria offer examples of novel access and benefit sharing practices of local and indigenous farming communities. The examples are linked to new partnership configurations of multiple stakeholders interested in supporting these communities. The effective and fair implementation of mechanisms supported by appropriate policies and laws will ultimately be the most important assessment factor of the success of any formal access and benefit sharing regime

Safeguarding local crop knowledge: the use of community biodiversity registers

This brief presents suggestions for the design and use of a community biodiversity register as a practical tool for communities to: (i) establish an inventory to allow monitoring of crop diversity and to document its associated farmer (traditional) knowledge, (ii) generate a collective sense of community empowerment and ownership of genetic resources as a way to decentralize their management and conservation, and (iii) provide a record of the knowledge and uses of local biodiversity that can prevent biopiracy and enable the equitable sharing of benefits arising from the use of genetic resources. Examples from Nepal and South Africa are given

Bancos comunitarios de semillas: origenes, evolucion y perspectivas

Los bancos comunitarios de semillas aparecieron por primera vez hacia finales de la decada de 1980 y fueron establecidos con el apoyo de organizaciones no gubernamentales internacionales y nacionales. Este libro es el primero en proporcionar una revision global de su desarrollo e incluye un amplio rango de estudios de caso

In-loop squeezing is real squeezing to an in-loop atom

Electro-optical feedback can produce an in-loop photocurrent with arbitrarily low noise. This is not regarded as evidence of `real' squeezing because squeezed light cannot be extracted from the loop using a linear beam splitter. Here I show that illuminating an atom (which is a nonlinear optical element) with `in-loop' squeezed light causes line-narrowing of one quadrature of the atom's fluorescence. This has long been regarded as an effect which can only be produced by squeezing. Experiments on atoms using in-loop squeezing should be much easier than those with conventional sources of squeezed light.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, submitted to PR

Strongly Coupled Matter-Field and Non-Analytic Decay Rate of Dipole Molecules in a Waveguide

The decay rate \gam of an excited dipole molecule inside a waveguide is evaluated for the strongly coupled matter-field case near a cutoff frequency \ome_c without using perturbation analysis. Due to the singularity in the density of photon states at the cutoff frequency, we find that \gam depends non-analytically on the coupling constant $\ggg$ as $\ggg^{4/3}$. In contrast to the ordinary evaluation of \gam which relies on the Fermi golden rule (itself based on perturbation analysis), \gam has an upper bound and does not diverge at \ome_c even if we assume perfect conductance in the waveguide walls. As a result, again in contrast to the statement found in the literature, the speed of emitted light from the molecule does not vanish at \ome_c and is proportional to $c\ggg^{2/3}$ which is on the order of $10^3 \sim 10^4$ m/s for typical dipole molecules.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figure

Bancos comunitarios de semillas y el uso de recompensas por servicios de conservación de la agrobiodiversidad: primeras experiencias de la Sierra de Cuchumatanes, Huehuetenango, Guatemala

Los cultivos de gran diversidad como el maíz, fríjol y papa incluyen muchas variedades de alto valor público nacional y global, aunque solo algunas tienen sus valores reconocidos por los mercados. Esto afecta el estado de conservación de las variedades. Una solución innovadora para este dilema de provisión de bienes públicos usa los conceptos probados de pagos por servicios ecosistémicos (PSE) y los aplica a la gestión de la agrobiodiversidad. Su aplicación en la Sierra de los Cuchumatanes, Huehuetenango en Guatemala se revela la importancia de los mecanismos de incentivos para apoyar la gestión de los recursos genéticos por las propias comunidades y las importantes funciones que los bancos comunitarios de semilla pueden desempeñar en este contexto

Quantum Communication with Phantom Photons

We show that quantum information may be transferred between atoms in different locations by using ``phantom photons'': the atoms are coupled through electromagnetic fields, but the corresponding field modes do not have to be fully populated. In the case where atoms are placed inside optical cavities, errors in quantum information processing due to photon absorption inside the cavity are diminished in this way. This effect persists up to intercavity distances of about a meter for the current levels of cavity losses, and may be useful for distributed quantum computing.Comment: 6 pages RevTex, 4 eps figures included. Revised calculation with more details about mode structure calculation and the introduction of losse