CIHEAM Press Review

By collaborating more closely together, the public and private seed sectors can unlock new, creative solutions that may, in fact, deliver the goal of ending hunger against all odds, Michael Keller writes.

Seed saver, writer, educator, and worker and co-owner with the Virginia-based Southern Exposure Seed Exchange Ira Wallace wants people to know the story behind the seeds that are grown. Through her work, Wallace is trying to preserve history while ensuring a sustainable future for food systems.

Picture a mature, broad-branched tree like an oak, maple or fig. How does it reproduce so that its offspring don’t grow up in its shadow, fighting for light?

The answer is seed dispersal. Plants have evolved many strategies for spreading their seeds away from the parent plant. Some produce seedlings that float on the wind. Others have fruits that actually explode, ejecting their seeds.

Seed saving is offers a way to regain control over food production and build resilient and local food systems.

Across all of human history, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, more than 6,000 plant species have been cultivated for food.

But today, fewer than 3 percent of these make major contributions to the food supply on global, regional, or national levels. In fact, two-thirds of total worldwide crop production is currently made up of just nine species, according to FAO data.

Can one woman's mission to revive ancient heirloom seeds inspire a celebration of traditional Palestinian food?

In the fields and terraces of the occupied West Bank, a Palestinian woman is leading a quiet revolution.

Vivien Sansour is distributing rare, ancient heirloom seeds to Palestinian farmers.

Inspired by memories of her grandmother and the delicious food of her childhood, Vivien wants to reintroduce long forgotten Palestinian produce to the tables of people across the West Bank and beyond. And she believes these organic, climate change-resistant seeds are the key to that.