At present, China's potato planting area and output each account for one quarter of the world's total.
As the strategy of making potatoes a staple food quietly advances, the "2015 World Potato Congress" was recently held in Yanqing, Beijing, where more than a thousand potato experts from 37 countries and regions gathered at the foot of the Badaling Great Wall. Minister of Agriculture Han Changfu said that in China today, the potato industry will usher in a new period of rapid development, and the potato industry will become a witness to the improvement of China's modern agricultural level. The humble potato has met a new opportunity.
Making it a staple food means putting more potatoes into the "grain bag"
Those who truly feel the driving force of the strategy to make potatoes a staple food are the people in the fields.
Stretching to the horizon. Blue and white potato flowers sway in the wind. Beside the large potato field in Renfa Village, Henan Township, Keshan County, Heilongjiang Province, Li Fengyu, chairman of the Renfa Agricultural Machinery Professional Cooperative, habitually stands with his hands behind his back, inspecting the growth of the crops. "With wide ridges and deep plowing, Renfa's potatoes have high per-unit yields and good appearance, and can fetch a good price. The cooperative has signed orders with leading enterprises, so there is no worry about sales."
Potatoes are China's fourth-largest grain crop. Last year, the national potato planting area was 5,570 thousand hectares, and fresh potato output exceeded 95 million tonnes. Both the area and the output account for about 1/4 of the world's total, making China the largest potato-producing country. Vice Minister of Agriculture Yu Xinrong said that making potatoes a staple food is an inherent requirement of grain structure adjustment.
With a tight balance between grain supply and demand, there is an urgent need to find new support points through grain structure adjustment. Although China's grain production has achieved consecutive years of bumper harvests, the overall supply and demand of grain remains in a tight balance. For some time to come, China's demand for grain consumption will still trend toward rigid growth. It is estimated that by 2020, the increase in grain demand will be more than 50 million tonnes. Looking outward, last year China's grain imports exceeded 100 million tonnes (about 70 million tonnes of soybeans and about 20 million tonnes of cereals), and the import trend is still growing. Looking inward, China's three major grain crops - rice, corn and wheat - are affected by cultivated land area, planting returns and yield-increase potential, and new room for increasing production is limited.
Accelerating the development of potato production can continuously enhance the overall grain production capacity. Compared with wheat and rice, potatoes are cold-tolerant, drought-tolerant and barren-tolerant. In China, they are planted from south to north, from high altitude to low altitude, and in all four seasons of spring, summer, autumn and winter. In particular, southern regions have great potential for developing potatoes on winter fallow fields. At present, China's potato per-unit yield is only a little more than 1 tonne, only 80% of the world average and less than 1/3 of the level of developed countries, so the potential for increasing production is relatively large.
Promoting the development of potato staple products and the industry can achieve sustainable agricultural development. Li Guangcun, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, said that in arid and semi-arid areas with annual precipitation of about 350 millimeters, cereal crops have difficulty growing, while potatoes can not only grow normally but also reduce soil erosion. Experiments show that in the North China groundwater overexploitation area with annual precipitation of 500 millimeters, potato yields can still reach 1.8 tonnes per mu.
Potato staple products will enter more residents' households
"One radish and two eggs (referring to potatoes), that is everyone's daily life." For Erjia, a Yi ethnic villager in Longshu Township, Ludian County, Yunnan Province, tucked away in a poor mountainous area, potatoes are a staple food he cannot go a day without. Here, at an altitude of more than 2,000 meters, the villagers are surrounded by mountains. Potatoes are easy to plant and grow well. What the villagers eat is mostly potatoes, secondarily corn, and only a small part rice……
Liu Qiang, director of the Zhaotong City Poverty Alleviation Office in Yunnan Province, said that throughout the Wumeng Mountain area, most villagers grow potatoes for self-sufficiency. Now, promoting potatoes as a staple food to meet the needs of city residents can also increase farmers' incomes. "The potato industry will no longer be synonymous with economically underdeveloped areas, and potatoes will no longer be merely the staple food of the poor."
The key to making potatoes a staple food is to make them into staple products and increase consumption.
Vice Minister of Agriculture Yu Xinrong pointed out that making potatoes a staple food means processing potatoes into staple food products that suit Chinese consumption habits and can occupy an important proportion in daily diets, as an important supplement to the three major staple grains of rice, corn and wheat. Potatoes are a grain crop very suitable for becoming a staple food. They are comprehensive and balanced in nutrition, rich in multiple vitamins, dietary fiber, potassium salts and polyphenols, and high in nutritional value.
Making them a staple food has research and development support. Taking potato variety breeding as an example, the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences has completed a fine-scale potato genome map, laying a theoretical foundation for realizing potato molecular breeding. At present, China has established a national-level potato germplasm resource bank, preserving nearly 2,000 germplasm resources, providing abundant genetic resources for breeding special varieties for staple food processing.
Making them a staple food has consumption-oriented cultivation. On June 1 this year, the first-generation potato steamed buns with 30% whole potato flour were successfully launched in Beijing. They are now sold in more than 200 supermarkets in Beijing, marking that potato staple products have officially become part of residents' dining tables. At present, China has also successfully developed second-generation potato staple products, raising the proportion of whole potato flour in staple products such as potato steamed buns, noodles and rice noodles from 40%, 35% and 15% to 70%, 45% and 55% respectively. It has also developed a series of new potato staple products such as hulatang and youtiao.
Li Guangcun said that in order to meet the needs of three different levels - industrial production, chain catering and large canteens, and ordinary households - China has developed special equipment for potato staple food processing, such as integrated bionic noodle-rolling machines and one-step rice noodle forming machines, creating opportunities and conditions for more potato staple products to enter urban and rural residents' households.
Breed special varieties and build high-quality raw material bases
The prospects look promising.
Looking ahead to the future of making potatoes a staple food, Wang Xiaohu, a researcher at the Institute of Food and Nutrition Development of the Ministry of Agriculture, said that through analysis and calculation, by 2025, China's potato output will increase by 52 billion jin (converted to grain), with average per-mu yield reaching 1,500 kilograms, 350 kilograms higher than at present, per-mu returns increasing by more than 300 yuan, farmers' net income from potato planting increasing by 45 billion yuan, and driving the added value of the agricultural product processing industry to exceed 300 billion yuan……
However, to smoothly put potatoes into the 'grain bag' and realize making potatoes a staple food, it is necessary to directly confront the existing difficulties.
Varieties are still lacking. At present, only a few potato varieties in China are suitable for staple food development with Chinese characteristics, and different staple food products have different requirements for potato varieties. Making steamed buns and noodles requires varieties with high extensibility of whole potato flour, while making rice noodles does not. Therefore, breeding more varieties of different ecological types suitable for processing different staple food products is key.
Planting returns are not stable enough. In recent years, potato prices have fluctuated severely. From 2011 to 2013, potato prices went from the lowest point through a stable period to a high period. In 2014, potato prices in most producing areas entered a downturn again, and at present prices in various potato producing areas have begun to rise again. Therefore, stabilizing potato planting returns and raising farmers' enthusiasm for planting are very key.
Processing costs are relatively high. Wang Xiaohu said that taking whole potato flour as an example, to process potatoes into whole flour requires multiple procedures such as cleaning, peeling, sorting, slicing, rinsing, pre-cooking, cooling, steaming, mashing, dehydration and drying, which increases the production cost of whole potato flour. At present, the price of whole potato flour is about 10,000 yuan/tonne, 3 to 4 times that of wheat flour. The relatively high cost of products using whole flour as a raw material is an important limiting factor in making potatoes a staple food.
With one less industrial difficulty, there is one more industrial advantage. Yu Xinrong said that making potatoes a staple food must follow the concept of "nutrition guides consumption, and consumption guides production." It is necessary to breed a batch of special varieties for staple food processing, build a batch of high-quality raw material production bases, develop a batch of staple food products and processing techniques, and support a batch of leading enterprises in staple food processing. It is necessary to achieve specialized varieties, regionalized planting, mechanized production, industrialized operation and staple-food-based products, forming a new pattern of coordinated development of potatoes and grains. At present, the Ministry of Agriculture is stepping up the formulation of the "National Plan for the Development of Potato Staple Products and Industry," which will be released in due course.