Potato

The usual way to grow potatoes in Spain is as follows. Other countries like the USA surely follow similar processes:

• 2000 kg of chemical fertilizer is used per hectare
• one treatment of fungicides on the potato seedlings themselves to prevent rhizoctonia
• 2 to 4 treatments of fungicides on the growing crop to prevent mildew
• one treatment of insecticides at seeding
• 2 to 3 treatments of insecticides on the growing crop against beetle, gray worm, etc.
• in the preparation phase before seeding, herbicides are used to kill all plants
• herbicides in the growing phase of the potato to kill all competing plants so that there is no competition for resources (fertilizers, etc.)
• herbicides to kill the green part of the potato that is above the ground in preparation for the harvest
• anti-germination treatment of the harvested potatoes so that they can be sold later

I always thought that potatoes are a rather simple plant requiring a rather simple process. But in today's agro-industry even to grow potatoes we have 2 tones of fertilizers per ha, ca. 4 treatments of fungicides, 3-4 treatments of insecticides, 2 treatments of herbicides and 1 treatment of anti-germination. And we are not even talking about GM potatoes.

That certainly killed my apetite for industrial potatoes. (Data Source: EkoLurra Magazine, 33th edition, winter 2008, p.19).