Originally Posted By: JohnE
Interesting bit about the banana but the potato "famine" wasn't caused by any natural disaster or disease, unless you count human greed as a disease.

The potato "famine" was caused by sellers of potatoes.

JohnE


No, the potato famine was caused by a fungal blight. The blight is still here in our potato crops. But we control it better and have more resistant types of potato.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phytophthora_infestans

The Irish potatoes were all of one type and all descended from one original plant. They had no resistance.

One reason why potatoes fed the Irish was they were cheap food.
They could get 10 times as much food out of a field by growing potatoes instead of wheat or barley.
So the Irish peasants grew potatoes in their own fields and grew grain in their landlords fields for export.

Why the Irish starved so badly while Ireland shipped food to England is another story, and you would be right to blame the severity of the famine on bad politics and greed.

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