Study shows global climate warming could seriously effect Peru’s potato crop

A trio of climate scientists have shifted their forest research techniques to the rural farming regions of the Peruvian tropical Andes and the warming impact on two dietary staples of Latin America — potatoes and corn. Their findings, published last month in the journal Global Change Biology, are grim. “For these crops, which are representative of other crops grown in the tropics, it’s a damned if you do, damned if you don’t outcome,” said Kenneth Feeley, a tropical biologist at the University of Miami and a study co-author. “If farmers ignore climate change and keep farming the same fields they always have, we find it’s going to be disastrous for these crops.” The climate impact on potato farmers was worse than that of corn. Peru’s international agricultural center also studies potato production and is actively looking for solutions to protect crops from climate change. More