Q&A with Potato Breeder Dr. Sagar Sathuvalli
By Sonia A. Hall, Center for Sustaining Agriculture and Natural Resources, Washington State University
This article is part of a series where we share insights from conversations that I had with public plant breeders across the Pacific Northwest about their breeding programs and how climate change considerations intersect with their work. Through these conversations, I wanted to better understand the complexities of the plant breeders’ world, where there are elements that already provide useful information about adapting to future climates, and where there are questions—about the climate in the future, or the plants’ responses, or production, market, or other factors affecting a particular crops’ future—that intersect or even overshadow questions about how to prepare for future climates.

Vidyasagar (Sagar) Sathuvalli, Oregon State University potato breeder, in a test plot at the OSU Hermiston Agricultural Research and Extension Center.
Potato is a high-value, irrigated crop grown across Pacific Northwest states. It is affected by a range of pests and diseases, including many soil-borne pathogens. The need to break the cycle of some of these pathogens is a driver of crop rotation decisions. In my conversation with Dr. Sagar Sathuvalli, Associate Professor, Potato Breeding and Genetics at Oregon State University, it was clear that plant breeding had an important role to play in resistance to a wide range of pests and pathogens. He described a two-fold challenge to breeding for future climates. First, potato breeders don’t yet have good data on how climate change might change the dynamics of different pests and pathogens, and which might become greater threats in the future. And second, breeders must meet high expectations: neither yield nor quality can be compromised in pursuit of tolerance to climate-driven biotic or abiotic stresses. So here is how Dr. Sathuvalli is approaching these issues.
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