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Palm oil is a commodity that generally evokes images of mass deforestation, human-rights violations and dying orangutans. In Indonesia and Malaysia, where some 85% of the world's palm oil is produced, more than 16 million hectares of land — rainforest, peat bogs and old rubber plantations — have been taken over by oil palm, and there is no sign of the industry slowing down.
Despite its bad reputation, oil palm is the most productive oil crop in the world. Oilseed rape (canola) currently produces only about one-sixth of the oil per hectare — soya bean only one-tenth. But oil-palm plantations still aren't getting as much as they could out of their plants.
The main problem is that genetic and epigenetic variables can cause some palms to underproduce. And because oil palms mature slowly, growers typically don't know for three to four years whether the trees they plant will turn out to be star performers or worthless wood.
That's where Orion comes in. When the leaf punches sent out around southeast Asia return, Orion technicians process the disc of greenery within and can send growers a report on the quality of their young plants. Lakey predicts that, if adopted on a large scale, the test could raise industry revenue by about US$4 billion per year. And, importantly, it could do so without expanding plantations. "We can get more oil for an equivalent area of land — this could help take the pressure off deforestation," Lakey says.
The world's most hated crop is not kale?
(Score: 2) by linkdude64 on Thursday March 16 2017, @02:18PM (11 children)
It's non-GMO, gluten-free, low-fat, hold the onions, organic kale washed in pure organic children's tears instead of filthy city water.
(Score: 1) by kurenai.tsubasa on Thursday March 16 2017, @02:37PM (6 children)
You forgot artisan.
Eat your greens! Unless they're greens we don't want you to eat! Eat your soy beans but run to the fucking hills and scream the end of civilization as we know it at tofu and Garden Burgers™! Kale is the fucking end of civilization! Eat your flavorless iceberg shit lettuce!
“Organic” (as opposed to what? silicon-based?) is the worst marketing-inspired term I've ever heard (short of “cloud” but I digress). Yeah, organic kale costs just a smidgen more, sometimes. Organic lettuces and cabbage just another smidgen more, sometimes. But if I'm going to make a fucking salad, why the fuck wouldn't I want some fucking greens that have some fucking flavor?
Organic apples and pears? About the same price. My recent head-scratcher is organic berries being way more expensive, but hey.
Want amazing french fries? Buy some organic fucking potatoes, again about the same price.
Rapeseed oil, sunflower oil, generic vegetable oil, peanut oil, etc, etc. All have different smoke points. Have a large table of numbers [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 16 2017, @04:04PM (4 children)
> “Organic” (as opposed to what? silicon-based?) is the worst marketing-inspired term...
I'm sure that you feel this way, along with many others.
It's a shame that what started before WWII in England and shortly after in USA as the organic farming movement has now been (mostly) co-opted by big agribusiness. The farmers and others that started the movement and use of the word "organic" were very much against using DDT and other chemicals on their land, sticking to traditional fertilizers and methods of weed control. This capsule timeline puts things in historical perspective,
http://theorganicsinstitute.com/organic/history-of-the-organic-movement/ [theorganicsinstitute.com]
First two paragraphs:
The organic movement is more of a renaissance than a revolution. Until the 1920’s, all agriculture was generally organic. Farmers used natural means to feed the soil and to control pests.
It was not until the Second World War that farming methods changed dramatically. It was when research on chemicals designed as nerve gas showed they were also capable of killing insects.
A good family friend was a farmer in the Finger Lakes area of NY (previously a lawyer who wanted out of the city). He was an early member of a group of organic farmers in NY and PA in the 1950s (when I was a kid) and this capsule history matches my memory of talking with him.
Latest news on chemical agriculture is new information just uncovered about the safety of Roundup, it's alleged that research was suppressed:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/14/business/monsanto-roundup-safety-lawsuit.html [nytimes.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 16 2017, @06:43PM
Roundup is not purely glyphosate. Roundup's "inert" ingredients aren't all inert:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/weed-whacking-herbicide-p/ [scientificamerican.com]
One specific inert ingredient, polyethoxylated tallowamine, or POEA, was more deadly to human embryonic, placental and umbilical cord cells than the herbicide itself – a finding the researchers call “astonishing.”
So be suspicious of those who keep claiming glyphosate is safe and cite animal tests etc. Even if glyphosate is safe according to animal tests it doesn't mean Roundup is.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 17 2017, @12:21AM
Which is why I really hate that they call agrichemical-based farming "conventional." What we call organic farming should be called conventional since it was the way to farm for >99% of the history of farming and what we call conventional should be called something else.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by butthurt on Friday March 17 2017, @12:38AM (1 child)
It's a shame that what started before WWII in England and shortly after in USA as the organic farming movement has now been (mostly) co-opted by big agribusiness.
No matter how big they are, they must still refrain from the use of synthetic pesticides and fertilisers, and from genetic engineering in producing the food they call "organic," must they not? If such companies are to exist, it's for the better IMO that they have such food among their offerings.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 17 2017, @02:13AM
Rules vary by state and country. In some places "organic" has specific meanings, other places it could be almost anything. Even in places where the rules are strict, I have no idea how good the enforcement is. If an organic crop is all of a sudden hit by some disease or bugs, the temptation for some farmers may be to spray...
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday March 16 2017, @04:08PM
I'm heartened by the increasing availability and falling prices of organic produce, though the cynic in me suspects it's largely due to dilution of the original meaning, which has been under attack by industrial agriculture since pretty much the moment it was coined.
As for berries - it seems to me that many, especially things like strawberries, spoil very rapidly without chemical stabilizers, and given the plants often brief lifespans, might be particularly receptive to chemically induced "yield enhancement" such as is routinely done with wheat (poisoning the plant shortly before harvest to promote "last gasp" seed production). So I'm not terribly surprised that organic is more expensive - potentially lower yields, have to get them processed and onto store shelves faster, etc. Though I recall a new organic produce stabilizer was developed recently, something with liquefied orange-peel extract I think, that greatly outperforms even the usual surface poisons used on industrial produce. That might change things dramatically, if it can be produced at a competitive price.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Thursday March 16 2017, @03:12PM (3 children)
More hated than kale: rutabaga. Seriously, who eats it on anything close to a regular basis? You can't even find it in many grocery stores.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by Dunbal on Thursday March 16 2017, @03:24PM
Sounds like a model of car from the 1950's.
(Score: 2) by Aiwendil on Thursday March 16 2017, @03:35PM
How often is regular? I tend to make a dish (swe "rotmos") on it a couple of times each year. Over here you find the rutabaga in most larger grocery-stores.
Then again - I guess there is a reason it is called "swede"
(Also that is the only way to make boiled carrots edible)
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Friday March 17 2017, @01:21AM
Koreans eat a lot of rutabagas.
Washington DC delenda est.