Contact: Vanessa Beeson
STARKVILLE, Miss.—Mississippi’s leading sweet potato producers and the state’s leading sweet potato researchers celebrated the official state vegetable Thursday [Aug. 13] with Mississippi State University’s annual Sweet Potato Field Day.
The Mississippi Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station and MSU Extension Service event showcased the latest scientific work as part of an ongoing partnership between MSU researchers and farmers to further optimize the commodity, which has seen steady production and consumer demand increases over the past two decades.
“Mississippi-grown sweet potatoes are a nutritional powerhouse and dinnertime tradition on tables across our great state and well beyond,” said MSU President Mark E. Keenum. “We are very proud to support the farmers growing this high-quality commodity through innovative research, diagnostic resources, industry collaboration and consumer education.”
MSU Extension Sweet Potato Specialist Lorin Harvey, also a university MAFES scientist, said the close connection and working relationship with producers helps facilitate impactful projects that make a difference at the individual farm and statewide commodity levels.
“Close relationships with producers drive the research—we have a tight-knit relationship and open-door policy with our stakeholders, and we visit every sweet potato farm in the state at least twice a year,” Harvey said.
Mississippi ranks third nationally in the crop’s production, with Vardaman—known as the “Sweet Potato Capital of the World”—at the heart of the state’s industry. For more than 60 years, the university’s MAFES Pontotoc Ridge-Flatwoods Branch has been a national leader in sweet potato research. Harvey explained this work largely is driven by producer needs.
“The field day allows us to showcase a small portion of the nearly 60 sweet potato research projects in progress,” he said, noting the work includes projects at the station, on campus and on sweet potato farms. “Nearly all our research is producer-driven, where a farmer had a problem and came to us to find the solution.”
MAFES research addresses the entire year-round production cycle, from preparing and planting slips to growing, harvesting and storing the crop.
“We’re studying everything sweet potato, from health and nutrition, economics, engineering, agronomics, controlled environment production, irrigation, harvest automation, storage and much more,” Harvey said.
This year’s field day showcased irrigation research and harvest automation. Researchers also discussed plans to break ground on a new storage facility and gave an update on the $4.8 million CleanSEED Project, an MSU-spearheaded effort funded by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture in partnership with the U.S. Sweet Potato Council to provide growers nationwide with healthier, virus-free planting material.
“The irrigation research might be one of the most exciting projects. We’re seeing the potential for producers to possibly double their yield by implementing irrigation strategies,” Harvey said.
Caleb Englert, owner of Englert Farms, a family-owned and operated sweet potato farm near Houston, partners with MSU as a farmer and industry advocate as president of the Mississippi Sweet Potato Council.
“MSU has supported my farm in so many ways, from research on organics, varieties, soil sampling, heavy metal testing, nematode testing, storage and more,” said Englert, whose annual sweet potato crop is 80% certified organic.
He said the Mississippi Sweet Potato Council also partners closely with the university.
“Anything the Mississippi Sweet Potato Council does, whether it’s research, outreach or policy advocacy, Mississippi State is right there beside us,” he said. “The team at the MAFES Pontotoc Ridge-Flatwoods Branch is great, and we have a good working relationship. The sweet potato industry is very thankful for what they do. They enjoy their work, and they take it seriously because they know it’s for the greater good.”
For more about the MAFES Pontotoc Ridge-Flatwoods Branch, visit www.mafes.msstate.edu/branches/north.php?location=pontotoc.
Mississippi State University is taking care of what matters. Learn more at www.msstate.edu.