Farming in Mysterious Ways

ESHKOL COUNCIL, Israel (Reuters) – Farming can develop in mysterious ways, as Israeli researchers discovered when the war in Gaza threatened their work on a resilient cocoa plant strain to alleviate a global shortage.

Just days after the Volcani Institute sent 140 seedlings to a facility in southern Israel to study cultivation in dry conditions, the area was attacked by Hamas. The Oct. 7 assault paralyzed southern Israel, shutting down the facility for months without electricity or irrigation.

“When we came back in January, we saw everything around us, all the experiments that died,” said Talli Ilani, a researcher from the R&D Darom site.

However, 18 cocoa seedlings survived. While no drought resistance tests were planned for these strains, the results were remarkable.

“It’s a very unusual result, to find a strain that can withstand 3-1/2 months of drought as new fresh seedlings and also severe cold front,” said Ellen Graber, a senior principal scientist at the Volcani Institute. This discovery indicates that new strains could expand the growing regions for cocoa.

Bad weather and diseases have harmed cocoa production, sending global prices soaring. Graber plans to clone the surviving plants—dubbed “super heroes”—and test them for other qualities, such as pest resistance, as well as identify the genes responsible for their resilience.

The Volcani Institute has successfully developed resilient plant strains in the past, including drought-resistant wheat with earlier ripening and greater nutrient content, as well as chill-resistant basil that yields year-round.