Educational Media Reviews Online

The vast majority of the peoples of the world have at the core of their diets but a few basic grains: wheat, rice, corn, barley, potato. This film explores how two societies, one in the Peruvian Andes and the other in Idaho, have fared with their subsistence crop, the potato, in the wake of El Niño, and explores larger questions about what humankind is doing to its genetic crop inheritance built up over the past twelve thousand years of agriculture.

The recent climatic disturbance known as El Niño resulted in drought and abnormally low temperatures in the Andes and unusually high rainfall with higher humidity in Idaho. Both regions had, over the previous twenty years, begun to rely on reduced numbers of potato varieties that promised high yields sold to farmers by multinational corporations. While exceptionally productive, these varieties are dependent on high levels of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, and, it turns out, are susceptible to changes in temperature and humidity levels. When El Niño disturbed the accustomed weather of these areas, potato crops were decimated by potato blight, a fungal disease, or flies. Long application of pesticides has resulted, in both Peru and Idaho, in these pests having developed resistance through natural selection. Potato farmers from outlying regions of Peru have, in increasing numbers, fled the countryside and populated the expanding shantytowns of Lima, the capital city.

The Andean Region once knew over five hundred varieties of potatoes, cultivated over centuries, and resistant to local pests with a minimum of chemical intervention. Local campesinos are now returning to an appreciation of their native varieties, and some sustainable agriculture self-help groups are encouraging and helping farmers to once again grow traditional varieties.

High-yield varieties developed by big companies now show by how slender a thread our ability to feed billions of people hangs: unusual weather patterns, which human-induced climatic change may make more common, coupled with pesticide-resistant pests, can more easily than ever spell starvation. The genetic stock of staple crops has declined rapidly in recent years, so that more people depend for daily sustenance on crops that are extraordinarily susceptible to pests and rain or drought.

This film gives a reasoned explanation both of the problem and its possible solution through reintroduction of traditional potato varieties requiring less in the way of fertilizers and pesticides. It is appropriate for a college or university library with an audiovisual collection in appropriate technology in agriculture.