Dissing Potatoes

Dissing the Potato. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Line On Agriculture.

Recently a Dr. Alan Green appeared on the Dr. Oz program and stated that he would not let his family eat potatoes due to pesticides. Rob Davis, past Chairman of the United States Potato Board says he thinks it’s all about ratings.

DAVIS: Well this is the first time that Dr. Oz has discussed potatoes and in passed episodes he has talked about the benefits of potatoes actually and has been an advocate for consumers to eat potatoes. This time he chose to talk about it from a negative perspective because that’s what his staff decided would draw ratings and they moved on to the next thing after that 3 minutes segment.

Davis says the problem with these kinds of programs is that they really don’t care what the fall out is.

DAVIS: We have seen this happen before with Dr. Oz and other similar programs and generally what happens is that they move on and the next thing comes up. In the broad consumer world it is not something they worry about for very long. It’s much more of a nuisance for us int he industry that we have to pick up and sweep up the mess after they move on.

And he adds that pound for pound the potato is tops when it comes to nutrients.

DAVIS: We just stick to the same core morals, values that we’re used to. We look at kind of the scientific side of things rather than just the glamorous talk show side of things. When you’re looking at the scientific side, the current dietary guidelines say that fiber are two of the top 4 nutrients that the American diet is lacking. Now there is no other vegetable out there that packs more nutrient with potassium or more fiber than the potato.

That’s today’s Line On Agriculture. I’m Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.