Portland Observer, June 22, 1963 Page 7
Potato is hot the world over
Mashed into a side dish or fried
into fast food, (he potato is easy tc
underestimate.
But potatoes are actually th<
world's bread and butter, act or din*
to the International Potato C ent«
in Lim a, Peru. Potatoes yield mort
nutritious food more quickly on lev
land and in harsher climates thar
any other major food crop.
cultivate all eight species, embracing
as many as 3,000 o f the 5,000 or
more potato varieties.
Rhoades describes the varieties
" T h e colors o f the rainbow and
more, many looked like miniature
pineapples, some like coral snakes,
and otheri like bright red cherries or
purple gumdrops."
When Europe's potato crops fell
victim to late blight in the mid-19th
century, a million people died in
Ireland, where potatoes were the
chief food. Now scientists believe
that genetic engineering o f potatoes
holds promise for a 21st-century
solution to the world food crisis.
The International Potato Center's
goal is to make the potato available
and inexpensive to everyone by the
year 2000 They are crossing wild
and native varieties with modern
Pomatowa and topatoaa
In West Germany, genetic engi
neers have fused two botanical cous
ins. the potato and tomato, to pro
duce pomatoes and topatoes. These
hybrids, they hope, will someday
produce food above and below
ground, and share their best quali
ties.
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In Asia and South America scien
tists are pioneering the commercial
growing o f p o ta to « by “ true seed,"
the tiny seeds produced in the
potato plant's berry. By this method
p o ta to « can be grown much like
grains
Only a 10O-pound sack o f seed is
needed to sow 1,000 a c r« , much
less than the 1.000 tons o f potato
tubers needed to seed the same
amount o f land conventionally.
The potato remains a rich man's
food in many poor nations. A com
mon expression in the Dominican
Republic, " « t a r en las papas'* (to
be in the p o ta to « ), means a person
is successful enough to affo rd more
than a banana diet. And in the
P h ilip p in « , housewiv« might top
o ff their shopping carts with a few
p o ta to « for the status they imply.
high-yielding ones, attempting to
manipulate the potato's built-in
thermostat to stretch its natural
adaptability to both cold highlands
and steaming tropics.
The wild and native varieties con
tain genes resistant to many o f the
265 diseases and pests known to
plague the potato. The ce n t« breeds
for this genetic material and distrib
utes seed for worldwide testing, gen
erally in developing countries.
It your cakat tend to fail < lot it could tie becauM the
you u«e ere too big. Medium to large egg« ere
best. Extra large may be too much for your recipe
•98«
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An Irish lad carries recently
harvested potatoes hom e for his
fam ily's dinner. Valued w o rld
wide for nutrition and versatility,
spuds grow in m ore countries
than any crop except corn.
This amazing vegetable is a South
American native brought back to
Europe from Peru by 16th-century
conquistadors. Its own world con
quest now complete, King Potato
grows in more countries than any
crop except corn.
Robert E. Rhoades o f the Inter
national Potato Center writes in the
May issue of N ational Geographic:
“ The average annual crop (291
million tons) could cover a four-
lane superhighway circling the
world six times.’ *
25
^rWSUPER
\ \SAVER
Produced in 130 o f the world’s
167 independent countries, one
year's crop is worth $106 billion at
consumer prices, Rhoades reports.
Potatoes are fourth, after wheat,
corn, and rice, in world production,
but because o f multiple harvests,
yield the most protein and food
energy per acre.
They are remarkably adaptable;
potatoes grow from below sea level
behind Dutch dikes to almost 14,000
feet up in the chilly Andes and
Himalayas, from the Arctic Circle
to the Strait o f Magellan, and in the
scorching deserts of Australia and
Africa.
Brimming with vitamin C , many
of the B vitamins, and iron, the
potato is so nutritious that a man in
Scandinavia lived healthily for 300
days on only spuds dressed with a
bit o f margarine. And eating a
potato without rich toppings is no
more fattening than eating a pear —
the potato is 99.9 percent fat free,
W ithout potatoes, meat produc
tion would slump and meat prices
skyrocket; nearly half the w orld’s
crop is fed to livestock.
Potatoes are also distilled into
vodka and aquavit, processed into
starch, paste, and dye, and con
verted to fuel. Researchers have
shown that one acre o f potatoes in
one year's time can yield 1,200 gal
lons o f ethyl alcohol, or potato
gasohol, for cars.
Rhoades notes that tomatoes,
tobacco, and eggplants are related
to the potato, but the sweet potato is
not — even though its Indian name,
batata, became the English word
potato.
Thouaanda of variatlaa
The fam iliar brown oval spud be
longs to the species Solanum tubero
sum, one of eight cultivated through
out the world. Most o f the world's
crop and all potatoes grown in the
United States belong to this species.
In the Andes, however, farmers
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