Green and Orange

Following up on Indian Mango Alert Level: Orangish-Green and A Matter of National Security, some data points: Indian Flag

  • The national flag of India has stripes of orange and green on a white background, The orange (“deep saffron”) represents renunciation, and the green represents fertility.
  • The U.S. Homeland Security Advisory System defines green on its scale as the color for a low threat level, with low risk of terrorist attack. Airports and New York City, where I live, are currently at threat level orange, which designates a high risk of terrorist attack.

Interestingly, as I was going to mention and John Dowdell pointed out, part of the ostensible reason for the reluctance to import Indian mangoes in the past was the risk of fruitfly larvae tagging along for the ride. The solution? A new irradiation process that kills the mango seed weevil. Kind of a nuclear security program for fruit.

If only that irradiation were powered by the nuclear fuel that India had gotten as part of its trade agreement with the U.S., we’d have a nice little circle of nuclear-mango life.