Idaho researchers attend World Potato Congress

By Bill Schaefer

For Idaho Farm Bureau Federation

CUSCO, Peru – A delegation of researchers from Idaho, where the potato is world famous, traveled to Peru, where the potato originated, for the World Potato Congress.

The 10^th triennial meeting of the WPC was held in Cusco, Peru, May 27-31 and attended by more than 800 people from around the globe.

WPC attendee Nora Olsen, a professor and potato storage specialist at the University of Idaho’s Kimberly Research and Extension Center, said the potato congress plays an important role in Idaho’s potato industry.

She said that for her, the biggest benefit of the WPC is the interaction and networking that occurs among fellow potato researchers and university extension educators from around the world.

“You get this wide breadth of what’s happening worldwide,” Olsen said. “We have a lot of the same sort of issues and scientific concerns, even production or industry concerns.”

Olsen and Daniel Caldiz, director of global agronomy research and development for McCain Foods, were the co-chairs for the WPC technical session on post-harvest and processing technology.

“It was a great opportunity to work with colleagues, work with industry personnel throughout the world and to identify what are some of the major issues,” Olsen said about leading the technical session.

“You could have presentations by somebody from Uruguay or you may hear what’s going on in China, (and get) a glimpse of what are the similarities and differences globally, and then (try to figure out how we can) use that science and education and business to further potato production,” she said.

There are multiple benefits to the Idaho potato industry to be found at the WPC, Olsen said.

“We are looked (at as a) a resource, primarily because we are known for our potato production and our potato industry,” she said. “There are networking opportunities coming out of Idaho. It’s not just production, we have a whole big business and industry surrounded around Idaho potato production and those are businesses that can expand and develop into other countries.”

Mike Thornton, professor and research plant physiologist at UI’s Parma Research and Extension Center, pointed to two critical values that he came away with from attending this year’s WPC.

“First, potato problems and issues are common across the world and to think that one country has the monopoly on the best research or best ideas on how to solve some of these problems, I think is a little naïve,” he said.

As an example, Thornton cited the spore trapping network recently set up in Idaho as an early warning system for diseases such as late blight.

“That was first trialed in Alberta, Canada, and before that over in Europe,” he said. “So, we’re profiting from the background work they’ve done and adapting it to Idaho.”

Thornton said that the second value from this year’s WPC came from its location.

“A lot of the pests that attack potatoes developed in South America and so understanding what sources of resistance to pests they have in that country and how we might be able to use those sources to solve some of the problems like potato cyst nematode in eastern Idaho, I think is critical,” he said.

“We’re starting to do that; our potato breeding group is collecting parents with nematode resistance from across the world and starting to use them to breed russet type varieties that would grow in Idaho for resistance to potato cyst nematode,” Thornton added.

During the WPC, Idaho researchers Joe Kuhl, Rich Novy and Jonathan Whitworth gave individual poster presentations on the current state of their research into trying to develop a  potato with resistance to the three globodera nematodes found in North America.

Kuhl is an associate professor in the department of plant sciences at UI, Novy is a research geneticist and Whitworth is a research plant pathologist for the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service at Aberdeen, Idaho.

The three are part of a consortium of researchers from Idaho, Oregon, New York and the United Kingdom working on a specialty crop grant called GLOBAL, an acronym for Globodera Alliance. They are currently in the third year of a five-year grant.

There are three globodera nematodes. Globodera rostochiensis, commonly called golden nematode and found in New York state; globodera pallida or pale cyst nematode, found in eastern Idaho; and globodera ellingtonae, found in Oregon and Idaho.

Whitworth said that they are focusing on trying to develop a potato with resistance to pale cyst nematode but also with resistance to the other two nematodes.

Novy said that his most successful crosses have been with Eden, a round, white Scottish variety, and Western Russet, a long tuber shape favored by processors.

“That’s the one that where we’ve made a population and selected out of it for tuber type and shape and for resistance,” Whitworth said. “Eden gives us resistance to the Golden Nematode and I would characterize that as high resistance and it gives us moderately high resistance to the pale cyst nematode.”

Kuhl is developing molecular markers that help identify resistance to pale cyst nematode to more efficiently screen potato crosses.

Novy said that their research has shown that the gene conferring resistance to the rostochiensis nematode also confers resistance to the ellingtonae nematode but that’s not the case with the pale cyst nematode.

“Now (pale cyst nematode), that’s a little bit more difficult,” Novy said.

Whitworth said that they’re happy with the results of the cross-breeding to date and hope to continue to develop greater resistance to pale cyst nematode with future progeny.