Ireland’s greatest gift to the world: The humble potato

2016 is such a significant year for us all in Ireland. It is the 100th anniversary of the Easter Rising, a huge milestone on Ireland’s journey towards independence. I suspect it will be a time to reflect on our identity as a nation, and our place among the nations of the world. As we commemorate this traumatic period in Ireland’s birth, we will remember the major milestones of the past – two great wars, conflict both on and off of our island, economic booms and busts and the coming of age of radio, TV and the internet – all of which has helped define who we are now.

But we should also use this time to look at Ireland’s contributions to the rest of the world as we march forward into our second century. We are blessed with our next generation of young people – educated, articulate, adventurous and brave, and with the national streak of creativity that has so far produced no fewer than nine Nobel Laureates. We have a tremendous record on international aid and human rights and our defense forces are globally respected for their peacekeeping abilities.

But perhaps our greatest gift to the world is the least lauded and most unexpected – the humble, and very nutritious, spud.

The potato, as we know, is more Irish than Guinness, The Dubliners and the Mountains of Mourne wrapped up together. It is embedded in our national psyche, a part of our rich and tragic history. Our dependence on the potato as a solitary crop was one reason behind Ireland’s mass starvation in the mid-1800s, when the dreaded potato blight got a firm grip, causing families to be wiped out or forever broken apart by mass emigration. We learnt from our heartbreak, and although still a huge part of our agricultural landscape, never again will Ireland be so reliant on just one crop.

The potato is one of the world’s most important foods. If you ever get stuck on a desert island, make sure you have some potatoes with you, as they has all the vitamins and nutrients that you need to survive. Potatoes grow easily in diverse conditions, and require much less water than other staples, such as rice or wheat.

All of these factors make this amazing food source a vital food in the developing world and in particular to the rural farming families of Ethiopia and Eritrea, where its cultivation under the Vita Potato Program is lifting them out of the poverty net by the tens of thousands.

Vita is an Irish NGO working in Ethiopia and Eritrea and has collaborated with Teagasc, the Irish Government’s research agricultural research agency to form the Irish Potato Coalition. Other expert members include academics, retailers, processors, farmers and other development agencies. This expert and innovative partnership brings together the world’s leading experts on the potato. There are over six million potato farmers in East Africa who can benefit from the program as the coalition is designed to scale out into at least six sub-Saharan countries.

So how does this impact on the ground? Aberesh Tomoko has been in the program for the last four years. You would be hard pressed to find a cleaner compound than the one Aberesh shares with her five children, ranging in age from twenty six to two year old Shuluka.

As head of the household and sole provider, life for Aberesh was difficult in this very populous part of rural Ethiopia before she got involved with the Vita potato program. She used to grow barley, beans, false banana and the local varieties of potato on her farm, but struggled to be sustainable. She rarely had enough food to feed her family year round, and never had a surplus to sell in the local markets.

Although the land where Aberesh lives is fertile, the farm sizes themselves are very small, averaging at about 0.5 acres, and farm practices are generally archaic and unproductive which limits the ability of these farm families to achieve sustainable livelihoods.

Participation in the Vita program enabled Aberesh to join a co-op, where she benefits from bulk buying of fertilizers and pesticides, and well as bulk selling of her potatoes. The seeds she uses are high yielding, and she has also got a potato store to help her keep her potatoes for longer periods of time. This is important as the prices are low when everyone is harvesting at the same time.

“The most important thing for me and my family is food security” says Aberesh. “I need to know that my family will eat all the year round. I hadn’t grown potatoes before because the local variety was low yielding and troublesome, but now most of my land is used for potatoes. I have listened to everything the potato coalition experts have told me.”

Aberesh is doing her best to better her situation. She has installed a latrine and hand washing facilities and this year she hopes to purchase and improved cook stove.

It’s an extraordinary thing to see this Irish knowledge flow into these African countries and transform the lives of many thousands of farm families. As Ireland reflects on the last one hundred years, we need to recognize and respect the potato and the role it has played in defining us, while ensuring that Vita and the rest of the Irish Potato Coalition can deliver this incredible food source to families that need it most.