China scientists rush to climate-proof potatoes

By Mei Mei Chu, Florence Lo and Xiaoyu Yin

YANQING, China (Reuters) – In a analysis facility within the northwest of Beijing, molecular biologist Li Jieping and his group harvest a cluster of seven unusually small potatoes, one as tiny as a quail’s egg, from a potted plant.

Grown underneath situations that simulate predictions of upper temperatures on the finish of the century, the potatoes present an ominous signal of future meals safety.

At simply 136 grams (4.8 oz), the tubers weigh lower than half that of a typical potato in China, the place the most well-liked varieties are sometimes twice the dimensions of a baseball.

China is the world’s largest producer of potatoes, that are essential to international meals safety due to their excessive yield relative to different staple crops.

However they’re notably weak to warmth, and local weather change, pushed by fossil gas emissions, is pushing temperatures to harmful new heights whereas additionally worsening drought and flooding.

With an pressing want to guard meals provides, Li, a researcher on the Worldwide Potato Heart (CIP) in Beijing, is main a three-year examine into the results of upper temperatures on the vegetable. His group is specializing in China’s two commonest varieties.

“I fear about what’s going to occur sooner or later,” Li mentioned. “Farmers will harvest fewer potato tubers, it should affect meals safety.”

Li’s group grew their crop over three months in a walk-in chamber set at 3 levels Celsius above the present common temperature in northern Hebei and Internal Mongolia, the upper altitude provinces the place potatoes are often grown in China.

Their analysis, printed within the journal Local weather Good Agriculture this month, discovered the upper temperatures accelerated tuber progress by 10 days, however reduce potato yields by greater than half.

Beneath present local weather insurance policies, the world is going through as a lot as 3.1 C of warming above pre-industrial ranges by 2100, in line with a United Nations report launched in October.

Farmers in China say they’re already feeling the impact of utmost climate occasions.

In Internal Mongolia, dozens of staff clutching white sacks rush to assemble potatoes dug up from the soil earlier than the subsequent downpour.

“The largest problem for potatoes this 12 months is the heavy rain,” mentioned supervisor Wang Shiyi. “It has precipitated varied illnesses… and tremendously slowed down the harvest progress.”

In the meantime, seed potato producer Yakeshi Senfeng Potato Trade Firm has invested in aeroponic methods the place crops are grown within the air underneath managed situations.

Farmers are more and more demanding potato varieties which can be higher-yielding and fewer inclined to illness, notably late blight, which precipitated the Irish Potato Famine of the mid-Nineteenth century and thrives in heat and humid situations.

“Some new and extra aggressive (late blight) strains have begun to look, and they’re extra proof against conventional prevention and management strategies,” mentioned basic supervisor Li Xuemin, explaining the Internal Mongolia-based firm’s technique.

The analysis by CIP, which is headquartered in Lima, is a part of a collaborative effort with the Chinese language authorities to assist farmers adapt to the hotter, wetter situations.

Within the greenhouse exterior Li’s lab, staff swab pollen on white potato flowers to develop heat-tolerant varieties.

Li says Chinese language farmers might want to make adjustments inside the subsequent decade, planting throughout spring as an alternative of the beginning of summer time, or shifting to even larger altitudes to flee the warmth.

“Farmers have to start out getting ready for local weather change,” Li mentioned. “If we do not discover a resolution, they are going to make much less cash from decrease yields and the value of potatoes could rise.”