Watts hopes the variety will appeal to modern consumers, as there is a growing awareness of the positive health benefits of increased consumption of highly colored fruits and vegetables.
“In 2003 we made a series of crosses with colored heritage varieties to try and boost the levels of these antioxidants in new, high-yielding and disease-resistant varieties.
“The crosses yielded a rainbow of color in the 2,000-plus seedlings AFBI produced, and they had better yields and disease resistance than the parents. A Canadian potato producer visited AFBI Loughgall and this led to one of the seedlings being registered in Canada as Purple Magic. And, yes, people are buying it and they want more of it. We are now registering the variety in Europe and plan to have it on the market by 2018.”
Purple Magic has now reached the finals of INVENT 2016, which challenges inventors, entrepreneurs, scientists and startups with proof-of-concepts and prototypes in science and technology to discover the commercial potential of their ideas.
Entrants compete through rounds of pitching assessed by independent expert judges to win a share of a nearly $50,000 prize fund, access to its global network and a place on the NI Tech Mission to California.
Source: potatogrower.com/Belfast Telegraph
