Review by Choice Review
In this part travelogue, part history, and part treatise, Nabhan (research social scientist, Univ. of Arizona, Southwest Center) uses Nikolay Vavilov's career to make a case for preserving plant diversity in the face of agricultural stratagems that sacrifice variety for yield. No student in agricultural science should be unaware of the significance of Vavilov, a prescient botanist who directed the All-Russian Scientific Research Institute of Plant Industry until his death under Stalin during WW II. Vavilov, credited with recognizing centers of genetic diversity for major food staples as well as the nature of environments that develop diversity, traveled widely to create one of the world's first and largest seed repositories. Nabhan traces the trajectory of Vavilov's career, including early influences and locations that Vavilov investigated. The author eloquently describes how current agricultural practices may be helping to erase the diversity that Vavilov was so anxious to preserve. Nabhan's great strength is linking Vavilov's history and the underlying science to the significance of global plant diversity; his weakness, minimizing the contributions of modern agriculture and molecular biology in the prevention of world hunger. This work would be an excellent resource for discussions and debates. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readers/libraries. M. S. Coyne University of Kentucky
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Booklist Review
Of all the deaths attributed to the siege of Leningrad, perhaps none was so bitterly ironic as that of Nikolay Vavilov, an indefatigable botanist and plant explorer who devoted his life to the study of famine through extensive travels to diverse biocultures in order to collect food-producing seeds. Imprisoned by a government that viewed him not as hero or savior, but as spy and saboteur, Vavilov died of starvation in a Soviet jail, the victim of Stalin's obsession to assign blame for Russia's war-time famine. Seeking to duplicate Vavilov's expeditions, acclaimed conservationist and ethnobotanist Nabhan traveled from the depths of the Amazonian rainforest to the heights of the Himalayan glaciers, not only to acknowledge humanity's debt to Vavilov's prescient theories, but also to assess the impact of intervening developments such as global warming and genetic modification. Mixing the compulsively readable insights of a well-researched biography with the painstaking details of a scientific treatise, Nabhan offers a historical and contemporary framework for determining the viability of sustainable agriculture.--Haggas, Carol Copyright 2008 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
