As drought continues to wreak havoc on China's farmland, agriculture experts are considering moving away from the traditional staple food - rice - and encouraging farmers to plant potatoes instead.
"The potato is more drought-resistant than rice and wheat, which suits China better as 60 per cent of the country's arable land is dry,"Qu Dongyu, a farming specialist with the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, said.
China is the world's largest grower of potatoes and the potato has a history as a fallback crop in dusty areas, such as in the dry north-west, where it is grown when the wheat crop fails because it can produce at least 60 per cent of its normal yield even in dry times.
