Potatoes came from Peru
The first
cultivated potato was grown in What is now Peru,
Researchers opined that it originated
only once, not several times as some experts had proposed. Their study shows the first Potato to have been farmed is genetically closest to a species now found only in Peru, the U.S. and British
researchers said.
This result shows the Potato originated one time and from a species that was distributed in Southern Peru, said David Spooner a U.S. Department of Agriculture researcher at the University of Wisconsin who, led the study.
The findings challenge theories that Potatoes were first
cultivated in Bolivia or Argentina, or that farmers bred them several different times in a number of place.
The origin of crop plants has long fascinated botanist , archaeologist and sociologist with the questions when. where, how , why and how many times did crop domestication occur. Questions were also raised about wild progenitors of these crops.
The study did not address when the first potato would have been cultivated, but other research suggest it would have been between 7000 and 10000 years ago.
Potatoes mostly belong to a single species, Solanum Tubersum. Baking Potatoes, Red Potatoes, Golden Potatoes and other favorites all originated in Southern Chile, neighboring Peru as concluded by David Spooner.
Spooner said that the Chilean Potato that give rise to modern potato is probably a hybrid of ancestral Peruvian Potato and a wild species found in Bolivia and Argentina. But in South America, many other cultivated Potatoes are eaten. There are many different colors- solid and dotted from white to Purple to Red.
The Researchers believe their finding show a single species, S Bukasovii, gave rise to the first known cultivated potato. It would not have closely resembled the big, pale fleshy tubers that people crave today. The wild species, many of them have tubers that is tiny, sometimes the size of a pea and sometimes they can be poisonous.