Web edition: April 25, 2008 As 2007 winds down, thoughts
naturally turn towards what might lie ahead. Meals rich in high-
carb tubers, perhaps? That's what the United Nations would like
everyone to contemplate throughout 2008, which it is designating
the International Year of the Potato. Farmers now harvest more
than 300 million tons of potatoes (Solanum tuberosum) worldwide.
That makes it the fourth biggest food crop, trailing only corn,
wheat, and rice. For 8,000 years, the humble potato has been a
staple in the South American Andes, its homeland. Spanish
adventurers encountered the New World crop roughly 500 years ago
and brought various types back to Europe. Today, potatoes are
cultivated not only throughout the Americas, but also from
China's uplands to India's subtropical lowlands—even on
Ukraine's arid steppes. A testament to the potato's Western
roots, production of this crop in the States and southward leads
the world. Fully 40 percent of the 2006 potato harvest came from
North America, with Latin Ame