Israeli Researchers Grow Truffles Worth More Than Uranium
Image by iStock
(JTA) — Researchers in Israel said they have succeeded in cultivating commercially desert truffles whose market price reaches $120 per pound — slightly less than the cost of silver and four times that of uranium.
The researchers from the Ramat HaNegev Desert Agriculture Center in Israel’s south made a breakthrough in stimulating a symbiosis between the fungus Terfezia leonis, which occurs rarely and unpredictably in nature, and the common desert shrub Helianthemum sessiliflorum, Ynet reported Thursday.
It marks the first time that the truffle, a highly sought-after delicacy across the Middle East and beyond, has been cultivated, according to Ramat Negev. The researchers said farmers will be able to harvest in small areas unprecedented yields.
Both the fungus and its host shrub require little water and no fertilizer, making the cultivation of Terfezia leonis potentially Israel’s most cost-effective agricultural crop. Commercial cultivation by Israeli farmers may begin as early as next year.
Bedouins in Israel’s Negev region are occasionally able to extract small amounts of the desert truffle with their tracking skills. But the supply is scarce, unreliable and labor-intensive, the report said.
Ofer Guy, the scientiss responsible for the successful experiment, told Ynet that the shrub provides sugars necessary for the subterranean fungus – which in turn provides the plant’s roots with crucial minerals and especially phosphorus.
“In nature you’d need vast areas just to obtain the amount of truffles we grew in the experimental field,” he said.
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you move on, I wanted to ask you to support the Forward’s award-winning journalism during our High Holiday Monthly Donor Drive.
If you’ve turned to the Forward in the past 12 months to better understand the world around you, we hope you will support us with a gift now. Your support has a direct impact, giving us the resources we need to report from Israel and around the U.S., across college campuses, and wherever there is news of importance to American Jews.
Make a monthly or one-time gift and support Jewish journalism throughout 5785. The first six months of your monthly gift will be matched for twice the investment in independent Jewish journalism.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
