Fighters target vital water facilities across Middle East

Geneva | Reuters –– Fighters are increasingly targetting water and sanitation facilities across the Middle East, exacerbating severe shortages for agriculture and households, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Wednesday. Consumption of water in the volatile region with rising populations was already at unsustainable levels in many areas hit by record-low



Syria plans to import one million tonnes of wheat as war rages

Jihadist rebels now control most of Syria’s wheat-growing areas

Syria plans to import one million tonnes of wheat as loss of government control over large swathes of farmland and a poor harvest have cut domestic purchases by half, a source at the state’s General Organization for Cereal Processing and Trade (Hoboob) told Reuters. “We are still studying the mode of imports, whether it will

A sample of Aegilops tauschii, a wild relative of wheat, collected in Afghanistan. It has natural resistance to the Hessian fly, a major pest of cereals worldwide.  Photo: USDA/ARS

Conflicts threaten plant genetic resources

Highest concentration of important wild crop relatives 
is in Syria and Lebanon

Future crop-breeding improvements could be hampered by conflict in the world’s war zones, say researchers from the University of Birmingham in the U.K. Many of today’s most important crops evolved from wild ancestors in the “Fertile Crescent” of the Middle East, arcing around the Arabian desert from Jordan, Palestine, Israel, Syria, Lebanon, Turkey and ending