The Canadian Journal of Plant Science, Volume 92, Number 3 is now available online.
 

This issue contains three review articles:

 

Invited review: Engineering aspects of physical treatments to increase fruit and vegetable phytochemical content

Clément Vigneault, Denyse I. Leblanc, Bernard Goyette, Sylvie Jenni

 

Review: Nitrogen assimilation in crop plants and its affecting factors

Bataung Mokhele, Xianjin Zhan, Guozheng Yang, Xianlong Zhang

 

and

 

Anti-atherosclerotic effects of fruit bioactive compounds: A review of current scientific evidence

Thilakarathna, S. H. and Rupasinghe, H. P. V.

Abstract:

Atherosclerosis is a condition which leads to a cascade of processes involved in thickening of arterial walls as a result of fatty deposition, which can increase the risk of cardiovascular diseases. Among numerous remedies, the consumption of fruits is believed to have beneficial effects on atherosclerosis development. Various bioactive compounds are present in fruits and they have been found to be responsible for exerting these beneficial effects. Fruit flavonoids and certain terpenoids are among the most efficacious fruit bioactive compounds that have shown positive effects on different in vitro as well as in vivo research models of atherosclerosis. The mechanisms of actions of these compounds vary from exerting antioxidant activities to anti-atherogenic and lipid lowering activities, based on different experimental models. This review article briefly explains how some of the fruit bioactive compounds have affected atherosclerosis under experimental conditions.

 

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Emerging details about reorganizations planned for federal agriculture research and food inspection have Canada's ag minister responding on the defensive.

 

"Farmers across Canada are divided on many issues in agriculture, but the one issue we all agree on being important is research," Stephen Vandervalk, president of the Grain Growers of Canada, said in a release Thursday criticizing planned cuts to federally-funded crops research.

 

"While we appreciate some of the (Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada) facilities were old and expensive to maintain, and had advised the government we would not oppose... closing some, we had firmly communicated to them that part of the savings should be used to maintain or strengthen the actual numbers of scientists doing research."

 

However, said Vandervalk, who farms near Fort Macleod, Alta., "it looks like the spring wheat program for the black and dark brown soils zones has been slashed by about one third at a time when the world needs more production."

 

The GGC specifically said AAFC plans to cut 41 research positions "in Winnipeg alone," at its Cereal Research Centre (CRC) with other jobs to be "re-distributed" to AAFC research facilities at Brandon and Morden, Man.

 

"Other research cuts are dispersed more thinly across Canada with more details to come," the GGC said Thursday.

 

Cuts so far are "a clear indication" AAFC is being moved away from research through to varietal development, GGC executive director Richard Phillips said in the same release.

 

The GGC, he said, has had "some assurances" that core agronomic work in areas such as the infamous wheat stem rust Ug99, now seen in Africa and the Middle East, will continue.

 

However, he said, "one has to speculate on how much more could have been accomplished with those extra bodies refocused, rather than released."

 

"Agriculture is a competitive modern industry, and changes will modernize Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, allowing it to concentrate on innovation, marketing and reducing barriers for business," federal Ag Minister Gerry Ritz said in a separate statement Wednesday responding to fresh reports of various ag budget moves.

 

"Our government was elected on a promise to balance the budget. The agriculture portfolio will realize 10 per cent in cost savings. Our savings are fair, balanced and moderate and will be implement(ed) over a number of years."

 

Specifically, the budget Finance Minister Jim Flaherty announced March 29 will see the federal agriculture portfolio's overall annual budget reduced from current levels by $309.7 million by 2014-15.

 

The budget aims to cut AAFC funding by $17.1 million from current levels in 2012-13, and by $168.5 million from current levels in 2013-14.

 

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA), part of the AAFC portfolio, will see its budget cut from current levels by $56.1 million by 2015, starting with cuts of $2.1 million in 2012-13 and $10 million in 2013-14.

 

In its own release Tuesday, CFIA laid out plans for a shift in some of its inspection work, noting its inspectors "will continue to perform risk-based label verification activities," such as whether a product labelled "zero grams of trans fat per serving" meets its label claim, or whether a food product has any undeclared allergens.

 

Referring to some of its other responsibilities, however, CFIA added it now also plans to set up an "online self-assessment labelling tool" to help producers, manufacturers and retailers create "compliant labels."

 

"The intent of this tool is to create greater industry awareness, understanding and compliance with labelling requirements for a broad range of information such as net quantity, date markings, nutrition labelling, bilingual labelling, and legibility and location."

 

The new label assessment tool, expected to be launched in 2014-15, is meant to reduce the amount of time CFIA staff spend working directly with industry to explain and clarify labelling rules, the agency said.

 

CFIA said Tuesday it also plans to lift regulations that restrict sizes of containers for food. Such rules, it said, are "outdated and limit industry innovation and consumer choices."

 

Food container size rules "are not related to health and safety," the agency said, and dropping such duties will allow it "to place a greater focus on higher priority activities including health and safety aspects of the food production and regulatory systems."

 

Country Guide, April 13, 2012 

 

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Already recognized as Canada's "food university," the University of Guelph has established a new institute to tackle the world's most important food issues through research, innovation, commercialization and action. A search will begin this week for an interim executive director.

"We've built an international reputation as the place for solving food-related problems," said U of G president Alastair Summerlee.

"Few places in the world can match our depth of research, training and teaching expertise. We need to apply that knowledge and experience to do more, both nationally and internationally."

The Food Institute is believed to be the first such group covering global issues in all aspects of food - production, safety, security, and the impact of food on culture, economies and the environment.

The institute connects the University's strengths in food education and research with industry, food producers and processors, consumers, partners (international, national, local) and non-governmental organizations.

Guelph experts will work with other research institutes around the world, and include faculty and researchers from all seven U of G colleges and graduate and undergraduate students.

"Most people now recognize that food is not just about feeding people," Summerlee said. "While world hunger is a huge issue, it's only part of the global food challenge."

Besides being a powerful economic force and cultural symbol, food raises issues in environmental sustainability and consumer health, he said.

"The Food Institute is a place where all of those issues can be addressed in tandem, with people exchanging ideas, innovations and information."

The interim executive director will help determine how the institute will be governed, including establishing an international advisory panel to be led by Rob Gordon, dean of Guelph's Ontario Agricultural College.

"Few institutions are as prepared as Guelph to address the food challenges facing the world," Gordon said.

 

"For nearly 150 years, we have excelled in research related to food production, processing and delivery. It is a natural evolution for us to take a broader and more inclusive approach by engaging people across the University, across Canada and beyond to create and extend new knowledge and to make a difference."

 

University of Guelph Press Release, April 17, 2012

 

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Meat consumption in the developed world needs to be cut by 50 per cent per person by 2050, and emissions in all sectors - industrial and agricultural - need to be reduced by 50 per cent if the most aggressive strategy is to be met, set out by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), to reduce the most potent of greenhouse gases, nitrous oxide (N2O).

 

The findings are results of a study by Dr Eric Davidson and are published in IOP Publishing's Environmental Research Letters. Dr Davidson, who is President and a Senior Scientist at the Woods Hold Research Center in Massachusetts, demonstrates the magnitude of changes needed to stabilize N2O concentrations in the atmosphere.

N2O is the third highest contributor to climate change behind carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane (CH4); however, it poses a greater challenge for mitigation since nitrogen is an essential element for food production. It is also the most potent of these three greenhouse gases, as it is a much better absorber of infrared radiation. But total anthropogenic emissions are about 6 million metric tons of nitrogen as N2O, compared to 10 billion metric tons of carbon as CO2.

The main sources of N2O in the atmosphere are due to the spreading of synthetic nitrogen fertilizers onto agricultural soils and the use and storage of livestock manure. The nitrogen contained in fertilizers and manure is broken down by microbes that live in the soil and released into the atmosphere as N2O. In order to reduce emissions, it will be necessary to apply certain changes to the food production process.

Dr Davidson believes that this can be achieved through improved management of fertilizer and manure sources, as well as through reduction of the developed world's per capita meat consumption that will relieve pressure on fertilizer demand and reduce growth in the amount of manure being produced. "We have the technical know-how and the tools to greatly improve efficiencies of fertilizer use in agriculture," states Dr Davidson, "although several economic and political impediments often stand in the way of their adoption."

In a draft of the IPCC's Fifth Assessment Report, four scenarios, known as representative concentration pathways (RCPs), have been adopted, and these represent possible means of reductions for a number of greenhouse gases. Dr Davidson evaluated the scale of changes needed to meet the predicted N2O pathways.

Three of the IPCC's less aggressive scenarios could be met by reducing meat consumption, improving agricultural practices, or reducing emissions from industry. The most aggressive scenario, where atmospheric N2O concentrations stabilize by 2050, can only be met if a 50 per cent reduction, or improvement, is achieved for each of the above.

To make these calculations, Dr Davidson relied on data provided by the Food and Agricultural Organization, which assume that the global population will increase to 8.9 billion by 2050 and the daily calorific intake per capita will increase to 3130 kcal. They also assume that the average meat consumption of each person in the developed world will rise from 78 kg per year in 2002 to 89 kg per year in 2030 and from 28 kg per year in 2002 to 37 kg per year for each person in the developing world.

Assessing the likelihood of reducing meat consumption in the developed world by 50 per cent, Dr Davidson said, "If you had asked me 30 years ago if smoking would be banned in bars, I would have laughed and said that would be impossible in my lifetime, and yet it has come true. Similarly, there would be beneficial health benefits for most Americans and western Europeans to stop 'supersizing' and rather to reduce portion sizes of red meat."

Are such changes possible for diet? "That will depend," says Dr Davidson, "not only on education about diet, but also on prices of meat. Some agricultural economists think that the price of meat is going to go way up, so that per capita consumption will go down, but those are highly uncertain projections."

 

You can view the full report by clicking here.

 

ThePigSite.com, April 17, 2012

 

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