# Introducing a New Crop **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 18, 2019, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686 "2019-06-18T15:10:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/21 "2019-06-19T03:18:15Z")
> [@Kent\_Clark](#): > > Back during one of the many farm crises of the 1980s, someone came up with the brilliant idea of [growing Jerusalem artichokes as a cash crop. It ended up as a giant pyramid scheme.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerusalem_artichoke) > > I’d also be wary of introducing a plant that isn’t already growing here.[At the very least, there will be paperwork involved.](https://www.aphis.usda.gov/aphis/ourfocus/planthealth/import-information/permits/plants-and-plant-products-permits/plants-for-planting/ct_smalllots_seed) Jerusalem artichokes are a beautiful, sunflower-like plant, but they are invasive AND they taste terrible IMHO. I got mine at a local nursery, and it was in the perennial ornamentals. The tuber-like roots were promoted as being like potatoes, but they weren’t. That a new crop could become an invasive species, or prove toxic to an existing species, is also a possibility. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 4:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/22 "2019-06-19T04:47:50Z")
> [@Slash1972](#): > > I thought that was because of insects that might be on the fruits and vegetables. It’s actually because of the fruits and vegetables? It could be insects or worms, but it’s more likely a potential disease, a fungus or something. ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 5:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/23 "2019-06-19T05:22:04Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > Agricultural products are alive; at least, at any stage at which you’re talking about growing them, and unless processed then right up to the point of sale. (Produce doesn’t die when it’s harvested, unless the harvesting process chops it into bits – small bits, at that. Individual corn kernels are alive. Meat and often fish, at least in the USA, are killed before sale; but again are alive if you’re talking about raising them.) > > This makes them different for three reasons: > > One, as [Tim@T-Bonham.net](mailto:Tim@T-Bonham.net) said and Kent Clark referred to, the plant itself may be invasive if grown somewhere it doesn’t belong, and may be unwise to import. Try searching up kudzu in the southeastern USA. Or, for animals, rabbits in Australia. > > Two, as Kent Clark referred to, the plant or animal may be carrying diseases and/or pests not previously imported to the particular area, and which may cause far more serious problems in a new area because their own natural predators aren’t in the new area. > > Three, again if you’re talking about growing things as the OP was, not everything can be grown everywhere. Some things won’t survive at all, or won’t survive to harvestable stage, due often to different climates but sometimes to things like prevalence of salts in the soil. Others will survive, but not produce well, due for instance to needing pollinating insects of a kind not available in the new area. Others will survive and produce, but the result may be tasteless or actively bad tasting, due to climate or soil conditions or possibly to things we don’t understand well. > > Bump, there can also be major barriers to entry to a new crop for established farmers. A farmer with the correct equipment for growing corn and soybeans on a thousand acres in Kansas has a whole lot of money tied up in that equipment. And that equipment’s no good for growing, say, daikon. You can’t harvest daikon with a combine. If you’re talking about growing it for yourself in a kitchen garden, or even in a corner of a field for the local farmers’ market, you can get away with a digging fork for harvest (better have a good one, though.) If you’re talking about converting enough of that thousand acres to daikon to make it worth selling it wholesale, you need a whole new batch of equipment, for planting as well as for harvest and possibly also for cultivation and weed control, which won’t come cheap. And you won’t be able to take it to your grain mill, which doesn’t have the right kind of storage, or pack it in your usual fashion, or sell it to your usual customers – there’s a whole lot of financial investment involved, as well as the learning curve which is involved with learning how to grow any new crop, even in an area in which it’s reasonably easy to grow it well. And you need different crop rotations. And here in the sort of area in which you’ve got a thousand acres in corn and soybeans in Kansas comes your neighbor with an aerial sprayer full of something that won’t kill the crops genetically engineered to resist that herbicide but most certainly will kill your new crop if there’s any drift . . . > > As I said, farmers do try new crops, all the time. But there are most definitely barriers to entry. Much of the experimentation is done by small growers in mixed-crop areas selling on a small scale, and/or by government-run experimental stations. Of course. But all of this is already accounted for by the OP, because it says the crop “took off like a rocket,” so none of these issues are relevant to the question _ **as it is framed** _. The crop has already been successfully planted, reaped, and marketed. So what’s the point of the question? This crop is no different than any other crop now. Why should it be any less profitable than other crops? Likewise, the statement, “After all, most anyone could fly in a few tons of the stuff from Japan and follow your example without paying you a penny,” also applies to any other crop. That is, whatever crop I grow, other farmers can grow it too, whether it’s imported or not. So it’s just not clear what the OP is actually asking. ---
**Author:** ![Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ccd318/32.png) [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_in_Qatar)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/24 "2019-06-19T06:38:02Z")
> [@guizot](#): > > So it’s just not clear what the OP is actually asking. I hope someday you might forgive me. I realize I must be a terrible disappointment to you. ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/25 "2019-06-19T06:38:35Z")
> [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](#): > > Due to the big risk of accidentally importing some plant that could escape into the wild, and become a dangerous invasive species, there are lots of regulations & paperwork required for the importation & propagation of new plants (& animals) into the US. > > Chinese cell phones, while arguably a dangerous & invasive species, can’t reproduce on their own. > > This is common in many countries, and even within them. For example, California has some strict controls about bringing certain fruits & vegetables into the state. > [@Slash1972](#): > > I thought that was because of insects that might be on the fruits and vegetables. It’s actually because of the fruits and vegetables? > [@dtilque](#): > > It could be insects or worms, but it’s more likely a potential disease, a fungus or something. A lot of it is pest control and a lot of it is industry protection also … if you pick up a gardening catalog you’ll see anything citrus, cherries, walnuts and almonds among others isn’t allowed to be ordered from out of state …you can grow them as long as you buy the plant in state … also most of those 5 or 6 in one trees arent allowed either … ---
**Author:** ![Filbert](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/filbert/32/3433_2.png) [@Filbert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Filbert)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 7:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/26 "2019-06-19T07:34:01Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > We have our own problems in the USA with patenting and restricting of varieties; but we don’t have that particular complication. – I was under the impression that your registry also causes problems for people wanting to save seed of unusual varieties and/or to breed their own varieties. Is that true? Different registry but yeah, sometimes. There’s a list of plants which are recognised as safe foodstuffs, which are either on there due to a history of traditional use or because they’ve been tested. You can’t sell something as a food unless it’s on that list. You can sell it as a novelty ornamental and mention that it’s traditionally eaten, but it’s not gonna wind up in the food shops until it’s been through the testing. There’s also a variety list- to register a variety, it needs to be recognisably different from everything else on the list, stable, so growing consistently the same and also, I think, be relatively sturdy. You also have to pay to have it registered, but that’s not such a big barrier as the food crop one. I can totally see the point- it stops farmers being sold magic beans, then the sellers claiming that it’s the growing conditions not the seeds that are at fault. If what’s growing doesn’t match the ones that were grown by the registry, the seed grower is at fault, plus there’s a list farmers can look up to check claims like yield before buying a new variety. It does cause some problems through, as you mention- you can’t, legally, sell varieties not on the list, which causes difficulties with maintaining traditional varieties and also for small-scale growers. It’s actually pretty much fine for the big commercial guys, as they’d be wanting to get their copy protection in anyway and they’re not trading half-stable varieties. Some places get around it by forming a ‘club’ of customers, so you join, pay and then get free seeds, and you can trade free stuff unrestricted. I do think they need a loophole so you can sell ‘amateur varieties’ clearly labelled in small packs, and yes, I have campaigned to my MEP for that 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 12:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/27 "2019-06-19T12:01:57Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > [Ahnold]Also note shipping costs: International bulk shipping is cheap. You’re competing with people in Asia. Think about this. Unbelievably cheap. Aus imports potatoes – one of Gods cheapest foods – packaged in Holland. Sure, a big transport hub, but literally on the other side of the world from us. And we grow our own potatos in state, but it’s cheaper to ship them around the world than to store them here. ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/28 "2019-06-19T12:16:19Z")
> [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](#): > > I hope someday you might forgive me. I realize I must be a terrible disappointment to you. No need to get sanctimonious now. Like **chappacula** , I’m just curious as to what the question actually is. Everyone is assuming that this is a _botanical_ issue, but the question, as framed, excludes that, and seems to be purely economic. It would be nice to know which was the original intent, but no one is demanding that. Relax. ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/29 "2019-06-19T12:21:46Z")
> [@Melbourne](#): > > Unbelievably cheap. Aus imports potatoes – one of Gods cheapest foods – packaged in Holland. Sure, a big transport hub, but literally on the other side of the world from us. And we grow our own potatos in state, but it’s cheaper to ship them around the world than to store them here. How can this possibly be? Don’t they get stored once they are received from the shipper? ---
**Author:** ![naita](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naita/32/5862_2.png) [@naita](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naita)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/30 "2019-06-19T13:24:22Z")
Pardon me for starting with some standard knowledge. Before patent law this was also true for inventing a new thingamajig. You spent time and energy inventing it, it started selling like hotcakes, and five people with more spending money and contacts than you swooped in and took over the market. Patent law was invented to remedy this, because the PTB wanted to incentivize innovation. Now there’s nothing stopping us from creating a “patent law” for introducing a product to a new market, other than “getting new exotic tubers on the market” not being something people feel need special incentivizing. If what you’re introducing is only being produced by a small number of actors where it already is established you can try negotiating an exclusive import deal, but that’s a lot easier to get around than a patent. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/31 "2019-06-19T14:08:34Z")
Once you successfully import a plant (not sure what regulations need to be followed for commercial food production) there’s the problem of convincing a wary public to eat it (though U.S.[del]non[/del] regulations are quite lax about making unproven health claims, i.e. “Eat Japanese Super-Tubers: they support Immune Health!”). A way to get a jump on competitors is to patent a genuinely new and improved variety/hybrid. > [@nearwildheaven](#): > > Jerusalem artichokes are a beautiful, sunflower-like plant, but they are invasive AND they taste terrible IMHO. I find they have little flavor but have a nice crispy consistency, sort of like water chestnuts. That’s if they are eaten raw as in salads (my favorite usage). Once tried them cooked, blah. They do spread like mad in a garden setting. I have mine confined to a circular bed, from which they’d have taken over the surrounding lawn by now if not for mowing. I haven’t tried eating Amorphophallus konjac tubers. Mine are currently sprouting after a winter’s rest, looking like dead mottled fingers rising from the ground. :eek: ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/32 "2019-06-19T14:45:29Z")
Like dead mottled fingers, or like shapeless penises? ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/33 "2019-06-19T15:09:42Z")
Depends on one’s state of mind, probably. :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/34 "2019-06-19T15:19:32Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Like dead mottled fingers, or like shapeless penises? The emerging leaves look like [this](https://imgur.com/a/Lz0JXLa) (and, as you can see, shoot up pretty fast.) ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/35 "2019-06-19T15:22:26Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > Jerusalem artichokes are a beautiful, sunflower-like plant, but they are invasive AND they taste terrible IMHO. I got mine at a local nursery, and it was in the perennial ornamentals. The tuber-like roots were promoted as being like potatoes, but they weren’t. > > That a new crop could become an invasive species, or prove toxic to an existing species, is also a possibility. Not to mention that as a food crop Jerusalem artichoke quality tends to degrade season over season, so producers have to replant sooner or later. And since they are tubers, if you haven’t completely dug up every trace of the plant, it will sprout again the next season, even if you’ve planted an entirely different crop, and continually after that until you’ve managed to kill off every bit of tuber. This gives you city folk an idea of how bad the farm economy was in the 1980s, that people who farmed for a living would even think about deliberately growing Jerusalem artichokes. **Paul in Qatar’s** tuber strikes me as a garden/truck farm crop at best. Probably the best wasy to make money from it would be to import Japanese seeds after going through the approval process. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/36 "2019-06-19T15:35:31Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > The emerging leaves look like [this](https://imgur.com/a/Lz0JXLa) (and, as you can see, shoot up pretty fast.) So like dead, mottled, shapeless penises then. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/37 "2019-06-19T15:37:55Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > I find they have little flavor but have a nice crispy consistency, sort of like water chestnuts. That’s if they are eaten raw as in salads (my favorite usage). Once tried them cooked, blah. > [@](#): > > …which way soever they be dressed and eaten, they stir and cause a filthy loathsome stinking wind within the body, thereby causing the belly to be pained and tormented, and are a meat more fit for swine than men. - English botanist John Goodyer, 1621. ---
**Author:** ![gnoitall](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bb73d2/32.png) [@gnoitall](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gnoitall)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/38 "2019-06-19T15:42:40Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > Well, there is also [_Amorphophallus konjac_](https://wimastergardener.org/article/voodoo-lily-amorphophallus-konjac/), which isn’t native to Japan but is used as [a food item](https://japan-brand.jnto.go.jp/foods/other_food/39/) there. ([They grow pretty well in the US](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=854201).) Not “native to Japan” is kind of misleading. They’ve been growing it since the 6th Century. And they grow a lot of it. ---
**Author:** ![Terminus\_Est](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terminus_est/32/3087_2.png) [@Terminus\_Est](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terminus_Est)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/39 "2019-06-19T15:59:04Z")
> [@guizot](#): > > Of course. > > But all of this is already accounted for by the OP, because it says the crop “took off like a rocket,” so none of these issues are relevant to the question _ **as it is framed** _. The crop has already been successfully planted, reaped, and marketed. So what’s the point of the question? This crop is no different than any other crop now. Why should it be any less profitable than other crops? > > Likewise, the statement, “After all, most anyone could fly in a few tons of the stuff from Japan and follow your example without paying you a penny,” also applies to any other crop. That is, whatever crop I grow, other farmers can grow it too, whether it’s imported or not. > > So it’s just not clear what the OP is actually asking. I agree with this. OP has already posited that all crop protection hurdles have been overcome and the crop has gained consumer acceptance. Maintaining market share in the face of competition is now a question of socio-economics. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686/40 "2019-06-19T16:00:47Z")
**Jackmanii** , if you’re puzzled by my comment, stop to think for a moment about what “amorphophallus” would mean. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/introducing-a-new-crop/835686.md?page=3)