Gujarat's potatoes most resilient to climate change

Eleven varieties of potatoes, natural and hybrid, grown in Gujarat have been found to be the most resilient to climate change of those grown across the country.

A joint study undertaken by the Social and Nutrition Science Division of International Potato Center (Peru) and Central Potato Research Institute of India came to the conclusion by analysing 45 varieties of the spud grown across the nation for heat tolerance, maturity rate, resistance to drought and blight.

The ones in Gujarat, such as the popular Kufri Pukhraj and Kufri Khyati varieties, were found to be most resistant to drought (0.98 on the Drought Tolerance Index), have a better maturity index (measuring 0.98 on the scale that measures how fast the tuber matures), and resist blight better (0.66 on Late Blight Index).

However, they showed poor tolerance for heat (0.01 on Heat Tolerance Index), however, the study lists this as the criterion that matters the least.

The study by Willy Pradel, Marcel Gatto, Guy Hareau, SK Pandey and Vinay Bhardwaj is titled 'Adaptation of Potato varieties and their role in climate change adaptation in India'.

"To analyse the extent to which Indian states are adapting to climate change by focusing on improved varieties of the potato crop, we developed a Varietal Resilience Indicator," said study author Willy Pradel, "The study has found that early maturity has been the most important and heat tolerance is the least important trait. Comparing climate projections with an adoption rate of high resistant and tolerant varieties, we found that Gujarat varieties are relatively most resilient."

Varieties from six states which make up 75 per cent of total farm area growing potatoes were considered; namely Bihar, Gujarat, Karnataka, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal. Gujarat's starchy root vegetable had the highest Maturity Index in the nation.

"Although climate change predictions are likely to affect potato production in this region negatively adapted varieties provide a high degree of resilience," said one of the researchers. "Heat tolerance will need further attention to prepare this region for the warmer weather predicted."

No Frying Matter

• Kufri Pukhraj and Kufri Khyati are the most popular varieties of the root vegetable grown in the western state
• Gujarat produces 7 crore kattas of the tuber every year. A ‘katta’ is a 50 kg gunny bag of the starchy vegetable. Two per cent of the total yield is exported
• While the potatoes did well on the indices measuring resistance to blight and drought, it faltered at heat resistance