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Spudtacular Potatoes: How the Humble Potato Shaped World History - Coggle…
Spudtacular Potatoes: How the Humble Potato Shaped World History
Origin: Potatoes originated from the harsh climate of the Andean mountains, which had lots of tuber and root crops.
Sustenance for the Americas: In the high Andes potatoes provided principal fuel for the Andean empire. Without it the Andean civilization could not have risen . In the Altiplano, potatoes provided pan energy source for the Inca Empire.
Domestication and development: Potato was domesticated in the South American Andes 8000 years ago: The people had to learn how to break down the solanine and tomatine (toxic compounds) by cooking and dunking wild potatoes in gravy made of mud and water. Eventually they bred less-toxic potatoes, but some of the old poisonous ones remained because of their resistance to frost.
Clay dust is still sold in Peruvian and Bolivian markets with the older unbred versions of potatoes to counter the poison.
As a result of the different varieties of cultivated potatoes, there is a wide diversity of potato species in the Americas.
To preserve potatoes, farmers of the high Andes invented a technique for preservation that is very familiar to ours: freezing food. They put potatoes out in the night air and then stored in permanently in frozen underground storehouses that could be kept for several years with no loss of nutritional value
After potatoes were taken to Europe, they created a population boom that lead to many Europeans moving to and repopulating the Americas.
Discovery: The first Spaniards in the region (a band led by Pizarro in 1532) noticed indigenous peoples eating potatoes and followed their lead.
Initial transportation from the Old World to various parts of the New World: In 1532 the Spanish brought an end to the Incan civilization but the invaders brought potatoes back across The Atlantic in the columbian exchange. The potato flower crossed The Atlantic from the Peru. Within 3 decades Spanish farmers as far as in the Canary Islands exported potatoes to France, Netherlands, and more. They spread from the British Isles Eastward and to Northern Europe and were found in Low Countries by 1650 and Germany, Prussia, and Poland by 1740, and Russia by 1840.
Effects on Europe: The potato's incredible yield, ease of adaptation, and nutritional diversity allowed Europe ACCESS TO A STABLE FOOD SOURCE. They could grow this tuber when more sustenance was needed, and this resulted in a radical changes in all aspects of European society.
The Columbian exchange brought not only the potato but also the world's first intensive fertilizer: Peruvian guano. When the potatoes were attacked by another import (Colorado potato beetle), farmers created the first artificial pesticide: a form of arsenic.
This set a template for modern agriculture, creating an agro-industrial complex. Competition launched the modern pesticide industry. In 1940-50 there were improved crops, fertilizers, and pesticides that created the Green Revolution: An explosion of agricultural productivity that transformed farms all over the world.
At first the potatoes were not used to 12 hours of sunlight so they did not grow for the first decades in the Old World, but then they found better conditions in Ireland.
A single acre of potatoes and the milk from a single cow were enough to feed a whole family of 6-7. Potatoes contain nearly every important vitamin and nutrient except vitamins. This was the only method of maintaining and healthy, and vigorous lifestyle.
Ireland's population boomed and became extremely dependent upon potatoes.
The Great Hunger: In 1845-1846 Guano (bird excrement used as fertilizer from the Americas) was brought over to Europe by ship. Although harmless in the Old World, it almost destroyed the entire potato crop in Europe due to the lack of potato diversity.
Ireland's dependence, the inadequate response by the British government in London, and the continuous exporting by Ireland led to the death of a million Irish people from famine and other diseases in merely two year, and more than two million people emigrated to the US. Ireland's population halved in a few decades
Potatoes supplied 80% of calorie intake in Ireland, and it was the homogenous food block that made potatoes so susceptible to disease. This event started discussions of genetic admixture and depth, and resulted in breeding programmes looking into methods for more food security for potato farmers.
Potatoes kept Irish alive in Connaught allowed them to displace English settlers from the island in 1780.
The spread of potatoes to Europe reduced the destructive consequences of warfare. Potatoes helped supply nutrition to war torn areas, since they could be grown virtually anywhere. They were hard to tax and plunder, which was quickly discovered during the War of the Austrian Succession and the Seven Years' War
King Frederick the Great ordered his governments to distribute instructions on how to plant potatoes hoping peasants would have food if enemy invaded in the War of the Austrian Succession in 1740. This furthered the spread of potatoes and also helped a lot of his subjects survive.
By 1800, potatoes became Europe's food reserve.
“Every military campaign on European soil after about 1560 resulted in an increase in potato acreage, down to and including World War Two,” wrote historian William McNeill in his 1999 essay How the Potato Changed the World's History.
From 1759-1950 the access to stable food source provided by potatoes allowed a few states in Northern Europe to exercise a lot of strength over all of the globe.
More potatoes meant more calories, which resulted in more field work in the summer and thus more potatoes again. Many people could eat much more and this resulted in an industrial transformation of Northern Europe.
Growing populations filled army ranks and resulted in the large army accruing victories across the globe. Eventually this allowed millions of Europeans to migrate overseas and into Siberia.
Europe's world domination from 1750-1950 changed the entire world: The Americas were repopulated, fossil fuels were used to activate machines...
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Potatoes almost completely solved the problem of famines that was previously very prevalent in Europe.
Between 1500-1800, France had 40 nationwide famines: more than one per decade. England had 17 national famines between 1523 and 1623. This all changed because of the potato, which doubled Europe's food supply.
“For the first time in the history of western Europe, a definitive solution had been found to the food problem,” the Belgian historian Christian Vandenbroeke concluded in the 1970s.
Effects on Asia
Potatoes were eventually traded into Asia through the trade route from India.
This transformed entire swaths of land in south and east China into agricultural lands for potatoes. Previously unwieldy land could now be used.
The Chinese government aggressively pushed agriculture as a result of the potato's introduction, and this established millions of new jobs of potatoes (and corn) farmers.
Today potatoes forma. considerable part of the diet of China's billion plus population.
The downsides of this increase cultivation was that mountain forests fell victim to new cropland. These slopes now had no trees and protection against the rain. This caused mudslides and flooding.
Potatoes fed the thousands of conscript miners at Potosi in 1545 and caused a flood of silver into the rest of world.
This caused inflation in many areas, including Asia.