Yes. Potatoes do store. BUT they have to be stored carefully and properly to last. They need cool, dark, and air circulation. That means, at this scale, big facilities to do that. IMAGINE the cost.
They are set up to produce them, not store them.
You can't just dump a mountain of potatoes someplace and have them be fit for humans later. It would just be a rat farm.
You are absolutely right. But it is not practical.
Well not now.
HALF of US food production wasn't going to your kitchen. It was going to the place you eat - OUT of your home. And you aren't going there, right now.
But your point is good.
"Potatoes will store for months in a very cold but not freezing environment, provided that they have been cured first. Cure potatoes in a moderate temperature and dry conditions for 1-2 weeks. Then move them into your root cellar."
My inlaws have a farm with a large potato cellar, but I suppose once it filled up and it wasn't moving. That would be a problem!
Are potatoes harvested year round or is there a season?
Farms in my area have been banding together in an effort to sell more produce direct to consumers to help with this. Maybe I will go buy some this weekend to help
Oh yes, you and other private people can stock up on vegetables and store them yourself at home. Enough for you, and for neighbors who may not have your ability to do this.
So there is Victory Gardening and Victory Storage.
Eventually you don't produce a potato you can't sell. The farmer goes out of business. Then there is no food chain.
Getting nature to feed us is not pause-able. Nature does what it wants. Getting food to not go bad requires lots of energy - refrigeration, processing, dehydration. That adds to the cost of the food.
We eat the same way we breathe. On a schedule. You can't pause that either. Farming and eating are biology. Biological life has a built-in timing that is iron-clad. It is a complicated dance. You can't break the rhythm or the dance ends.
Can't potatoes be stored for a relatively long time? Store them until distribution is found. Once restaurants are cleared to reopen demand will spike
Yes. Potatoes do store. BUT they have to be stored carefully and properly to last. They need cool, dark, and air circulation. That means, at this scale, big facilities to do that. IMAGINE the cost.
They are set up to produce them, not store them.
You can't just dump a mountain of potatoes someplace and have them be fit for humans later. It would just be a rat farm.
You are absolutely right. But it is not practical.
Well not now.
HALF of US food production wasn't going to your kitchen. It was going to the place you eat - OUT of your home. And you aren't going there, right now.
But your point is good.
"Potatoes will store for months in a very cold but not freezing environment, provided that they have been cured first. Cure potatoes in a moderate temperature and dry conditions for 1-2 weeks. Then move them into your root cellar."
And:
"https://savethefood.com/storage?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIk6K27rWQ6QIVB1YMCh1Mpg8jEAAYASAAEgIRN_D_BwE"
More detail:
https://savethefood.com/storage?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIk6K27rWQ6QIVB1YMCh1Mpg8jEAAYASAAEgIRN_D_BwE
My inlaws have a farm with a large potato cellar, but I suppose once it filled up and it wasn't moving. That would be a problem!
Are potatoes harvested year round or is there a season?
Farms in my area have been banding together in an effort to sell more produce direct to consumers to help with this. Maybe I will go buy some this weekend to help
Oh yes, you and other private people can stock up on vegetables and store them yourself at home. Enough for you, and for neighbors who may not have your ability to do this.
So there is Victory Gardening and Victory Storage.
What worries me is the one in 2021.
Eventually you don't produce a potato you can't sell. The farmer goes out of business. Then there is no food chain.
Getting nature to feed us is not pause-able. Nature does what it wants. Getting food to not go bad requires lots of energy - refrigeration, processing, dehydration. That adds to the cost of the food.
We eat the same way we breathe. On a schedule. You can't pause that either. Farming and eating are biology. Biological life has a built-in timing that is iron-clad. It is a complicated dance. You can't break the rhythm or the dance ends.