World Potato Day is celebrated on 30th May and the birth of this day is not very old. It was in the Year 2024 only when this day was designated. A day for celebrating Potato! Though the international year of Potato was celebrated in the year 2008, the United Nations Food and Organization had been brainstorming for many years to start this day. The day coincides with the National Potato Day of Peru, the heartland of Potato diversity. The historical accounts, the oral narratives and the folklore closely associate potato with the Andean Culture and with many ancient tribes of Peru. It is not only a crop of immense food value but beholds a plethora of nutrients including carbohydrates, fats and minerals.
Many stereotypes have caused a lot of misinformation about this versatile plant that caters to the food basket of many countries across the globe. The slur "Potato PC" or "Potato Camera", "Couch Potato" and many vernacular slang in some places demean the importance of potato. The slurs just seem to point out that potatoes are useless, lethargic and outdated stuff that should be put away and not given much attention. The other connation is that the thing is outdated in contemporary scenario. The person who is referred to as a potato is someone who has lost all his emotions, again conveying that this potato has no special significance. In many places, some racial slurs are also used for people who consume potatoes. Excessive use of potatoes by some tribes has been associated with poverty and social-status. The rich people often feel that the food plates should have colour and appear more palatable when they have greens, spinach, salads and broccolis on them. The dull white potato probably has no place on the plates who love color more. However, with the advancement of science and human ingenuity to explore nature and the bounties of nature, the perception and importance towards potato, an important tuber crop that grows across the continents has changed.
The present statistics and the data on the most important crops in terms of productivity, suggests potato is one in top ten in the majority of the places. Its acceptance as an important vegetable crop has increased all across Europe, Scandinavian Countries to Africa and Asia as per Food and Agriculture Organization. The plant tuber, the hidden half, is harvested in different seasons in different parts of the world. The native wild diversity in the crop is huge and there are specific cultivars, varieties and ecotypes that have evolved in nature on their own on one hand and many have been developed by conventional plant breeding methods. Evolution is nature's way to adapt and acclimatize in different agroclimatic conditions. Evolution driven by various things has conferred potato with traits and variations that has helped the plant to sustain itself. Scientists on the other hand are busy studying the tuber crop for the morphological, ecological, genetic and metabolomics variations. Many scientists have developed new cultivars and varieties and researchers across the world are putting efforts, collaborating and sharing knowledge so that the common goals of attaining food security, zero hunger are achieved. The focus of research groups is to have varieties with increased tuber size, improve the taste, enhance the starch and nutrient content, and most important new varieties are developed to combat both the biotic and abiotic stress. In the era of climate change that is confronting the entire world, developing varieties that are resistant to excessive water logging, frost and heat would be interesting.
Many scientists across the world in different plant research institutes are working day in and out to increase the production of potato as it is not only a food crop of major importance, but it has the properties that make it such a versatile industrial crop as well. The potato has also for long been used to prepare starch, flour and many other things. Bake it, cook it, fry it or roast it, it tastes good and add some condiments and garnishing stuff, you will get a different feel and present it as a whole, slices, sticks or chips, it looks palatable in all forms. It has now become a favourite of all young and old and is integral to Chinese, European, Andean and Asian cuisines.
The World Potato Day to be celebrated on 30th May is to commemorate the benefits of this important crop that shows immense diversity, in terms of size, color and shape of the tubers and that is a staple food crop of the new and the old world both. It also calls for bringing together the scientists working in improving the crop to address some pressing challenges that crop is facing on the field, from pests and pathogens and off field from the storage pests and enzymatic degradation. The day calls for discussions and debate on harnessing the full potential of this crop. It is also important also to go for some outreach activities and raise awareness on the industrial products, and other non-food products that can be harnessed from this plant.
On May 30, wishing you all a Happy International Potato Day, let us all celebrate the favourite food plant of east and west because for adults and children it is the best.

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