Publications /  Annual Report 1998

In Africa, Asia, and Latin America, CIP answered calls for emergency assistance.

The International Potato Center responded quickly to food crop emergencies in Honduras and Nicaragua, ravaged by Hurricane Mitch in October, and in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, to rebuild potato production after a four-year famine. CIP also helped Peruvian farmers overcome the effects of an especially severe El Niño phenomenon. In East Africa, the substitution of sweetpotato for diseased cassava helped avert a food crisis.

Seeds of Hope for Central America
Hurricane Mitch was the worst natural disaster to hit Central America in this century. The devastating hurricane that slammed the region in October killed more than 10,000 people and inflicted more than $5 million in damage. The agricultural sectors of Honduras and Nicaragua were hardest hit by the storm. Disaster officials estimate that the hurricane destroyed up to 70 percent of the two countries’ basic food crops as well as the seed needed to plant future harvests of staples such as beans, maize, and potatoes.

CIP scientist Noël Pallais traveled to Nicaragua for emergency meetings with representatives of the government and national programs as well as CGIAR colleagues to develop a strategy for rebuilding agriculture in Honduras and Nicaragua.

As a result, CGIAR researchers, along with scientists from national programs, launched an international effort called "Seeds of Hope for Central America," a two-year effort to rebuild agriculture in the two countries coordinated by the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) in Colombia. In addition to CIP, other participants include the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) in Mexico and the International Plant Genetic Resources Institute (IPGRI) in Rome.

Seeds of Hope for Central America is building on lessons learned from the successful Seeds of Hope operation conducted in Rwanda in 1995 following the civil war that shattered the country’s food production capabilities. " We learned from our Rwanda experience in 1995 of the importance of being prepared for disasters before they occur," Director General Hubert Zandstra explains. "The Seeds of Hope initiative there, for example, was only possible because several CGIAR centers, including CIP, had worked on research projects for several years. That knowledge and expertise acquired on crop production and variety adaptation was crucial in re-establishing agriculture and, eventually, food security. It also prevented a complete loss of research gains." Rwanda’s Seeds of Hope program, which involved CIP and seven other CGIAR research centers, successfully delivered modern seed technology to farmers, helped to restore food security, and reintroduced crop diversity.

Sweetpotato to be Reintroduced to Nicaragua
Although sweetpotato was a traditional crop in what is now Nicaragua, it is no longer cultivated there. Since the hurricane, the reintroduction of sweetpotato has become a priority of the Nicaraguan government. Long known as a calamity crop, sweetpotato is especially suited for emergency situations because it is a versatile and hardy source of subsistence and therefore a solid base for agricultural reconstruction. It is also an excellent source of vitamin A.

Nicaraguan Minister of Agriculture Mario De Franco explains the Government aims to "turn disaster into opportunity." Keeping the focus on small farmers, CIP and national scientists are reintroducing sweetpotato into Nicaragua and, in collaboration with CIMMYT, are encouraging and helping Nicaraguan farmers to plant sweetpotatoes alongside corn, a practice that has helped to reduce soil erosion in China. Sweetpotatoes also require relatively little fertilizer but produce a high volume of roots per hectare.

Honduras Adopting TPS Program
In Honduras, CIP is helping replace potato varieties lost in the hurricane by using true potato seed (TPS). Director General Hubert Zandstra explains, "CIP has built up a strategic reserve of TPS that allows us to respond quickly to emergencies such as these." To reduce the cost of potato farming, farmers in Honduras were being trained to cultivate TPS just before the storm stuck. Although the storm destroyed the first planting, CIP has expanded efforts to distribute new seeds and training materials throughout the country. "The use of TPS should produce large quantities of disease-free seed potatoes in a fraction of the time normally required using clonal seed potatoes," Zandstra said.

Breaking North Korea’s Famine
In recent years North Korea has suffered a famine that, by some estimates, has led to the deaths of more than 3 million people. Its potato crop has been meager (about 1 million tons) since 1990. In the last four years, two-thirds of the potato crop has been lost to either drought from El Niño or severe flooding.

Scientists at the North Korean national research institute using TPS techniques taught to them by CIP.

Potato, introduced from Russia 70 years ago, is North Korea’s third leading food crop after rice and maize. North Korean farmers plant an annual average of 200,000 hectares of four locally improved varieties that (as of 1998) had not been renewed in more than 10 years. As a result, late blight and viruses cause more than two-thirds of potato production losses. Planted on poor, unfertilized soils in various rotations with corn, vegetables, and rice, potatoes yield an average of about 7 tons per hectare.

Extremely eager to become self-sufficient in potato production and overcome its long-standing food emergency, in 1998 North Korea asked CIP to help re-establish potato production using both TPS and tuber seed. The Center responded immediately with a 1-kilogram donation of TPS (Serrano x TPS-67), hand-carried by CIP technician Rolando Cabello. He trained a dozen North Korean scientists and technicians from the Agrobiological Institute of Pyongyang in all aspects of producing a potato crop from TPS. CIP also worked with a coalition of agencies assisting North Korea to use the technology. They included the NGO World Vision; the Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance of USAID; Potato Production International (PPI), a private company based in California; and national program partners in Vietnam and China. The TPS provided under contract by PPI contains three combinations developed by CIP in the late 1980s (Serrano x TPS-67, Atzimba x TPS-67, and TPS-7 x TPS-13).

The seed provided by CIP has been distributed to government institutes in North Korea’s three major potato-growing regions for planting by local cooperatives. The goal of the Academy of Agricultural Sciences in 1999 is to plant 200 hectares (1 percent of the total potato seedlings) with tuber seed produced from TPS. The North Koreans are now preparing seedlings for the 1999 planting season.

Zandstra says CIP can also make a major contribution to tuber seed–based potato production because of its experience in neighboring countries with similar growing conditions. For example, CIP and the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences have developed a variety, CIP-24, that is currently being grown on millions of hectares in China.

The assistance from CIP and other organizations is expected to pave the way for expanded government ties between North Korea and the United States, two countries that have been in a Cold War stalemate for nearly half a century.

Sweetpotato Averts Food Crisis in East Africa
In northeastern Uganda, a serious outbreak of African Cassava Mosaic Virus disease several years ago devastated the crop, leading to a boom in sweetpotato production for both home use and for sale in Kampala, the capital. The quick conversion to sweetpotato averted a potential food emergency in a region that has been beset with chronic malnutrition and starvation from civil strife since 1995.

While cassava is making a comeback, with the release and multiplication of disease-resistant varieties, Peter Ewell, CIP regional representative for sub-Saharan Africa in Nairobi, says social scientists are seeking information on how sweetpotato production can be increased to meet new needs and markets, and how this would affect farmers. Sweetpotato is playing an increasing role in East Africa, and is expected to follow the pattern established in Asia over the past 30 years with a transition toward the use of sweetpotato for processing and animal feed.

Meanwhile, the cassava virus is rapidly spreading into western Kenya. Ewell said CIP is getting many requests from non-government and community organizations for help in setting up programs for the multiplication and distribution of superior CIP-developed sweetpotato varieties.

Chacasina’s Popularity Growing in Peru
The particularly severe El Niño event of 1997–98 increased temperatures in Peru from 3 to 5 degrees and drenched regions that had gone without measurable rainfall in more than a decade with torrential downpours. The result was potato yields cut by half in many major production regions, along with upswings in the numbers of pests and in diseases, especially late blight.

The severe late blight attack took its toll on many potato varieties, including one of Peru’s rising stars, Canchan-INIA, developed jointly by CIP and Peru’s national potato program and released to farmers in 1990. However, a CIP TPS hybrid, Chacasina, performed well under the stress of El Niño. Chacasina is a cross between the most popular local variety produced in the central Andes, Yungay, and a CIP late blight–resistant breeding line.

The success of Chacasina continues to grow in Peru. Harvests in more than 100 Peruvian districts where the variety has spread have been exceptional. As a result, the Center has been asked to produce two more similar varieties. Meanwhile, in the aftermath of El Niño, CIP has distributed 16 kilograms of Chacasina TPS to more than 5,000 farm families in 17 departments, 59 provinces, and 108 districts in Peru, according to Noël Pallais, head of CIP’s seed unit.