Christian Science Monitor reports that Peru's International Potato Center maintains genetic strains of over 4,600 species of potatoes which are indigenous to the Andes, alone!
"But aren’t potatoes from…? Tay understands the question even before you get it out. “Americans think potatoes are from Idaho,” he says. “Ask a European, and they say the potato is from Ireland.”
Actually, it’s Peruvian. Potatoes date back about 8,000 years, to the shores of Lake Titicaca, 3,800 meters above sea level, in what is today Peru. Incan armies ate potatoes centuries ago, and rural communities eat them today. An estimated 5,000 varieties grow in the Andean region; 80 percent of those sit in the CIP."
In fact, the center has maintained this array of potatoes for over 30 years.
With prices skyrocketing in corn, wheat, soy and other essential crops, the potatoe is seen as an essential resource.
"Just a few months ago, these words might have seemed hyperbolic. But the spud has suddenly been thrust into the spotlight, now that prices for soy, wheat, and corn have skyrocketed. The United Nations has called 2008 the Year of the Potato, as has Peru. Governments around the world are turning to the root to help ease hunger. Peru’s military is eating potato bread instead of regular white. And at this humble center in Lima, the phone is suddenly ringing off the hook, journalists are knocking at the door, and requests for expertise are pouring in from around the world.
'Potatoes are being looked at as one of the pathways out of poverty,' says Pamela Anderson, the center’s director general."
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