Third-year Report—Nov. 2022. Ethnographic, genetic, and morphometric analyses of the date palm agrobiodiversity in al-‘Ulā oasis

– Vincent Battesti & Muriel Gros-Balthazard (2022) — « Third-year Report—Nov. 2022. Ethnographic, genetic, and morphometric analyses of the date palm agrobiodiversity in al-‘Ulā oasis » Annual Report to AFALULA, Paris, Montpellier, CNRS, IRD, 29 p.

⟶ Annual report for the al-‘Ulā DPA project.

– Purpose of the document:

The agrobiodiversity is a major asset for current challenges faced by local societies. It repre- sents a fundamental resource for adapting agriculture to local and global changes. The diversity of crops, and in the present case the diversity of date palms in an oasis system, is constantly shaped by local populations according to their knowledge and expertise. Our project is entitled “Ethnographic, genetic, and morphometric analyses of the date palm agrobiodiversity in al- ‘Ulā oasis” (so-called al-‘Ulā DPA project). It aims to address the biological and social dimen- sions together in order to describe and explain the agrobiodiversity of date palms in al-‘Ulā oasis in Saudi Arabia. This document reports the progress made during the third year (October 2021—September 2022) and includes also the very last development up to No- vember 2022.

Planting of mature date palms of the so-called barnī variety by the DVACON company on behalf of the RCU in an area formerly dedicated to vegetable and cereal crops, in the old palm grove of al-‘Ulā oasis, Saudi Arabia, Nov. 3, 2022, by Vincent Battesti