Source: NCSU COLLEGE OF AG & LIFE SCIENCES, 5/4/20


Sweetpotatoes are a critical crop for North Carolina, and many places around the world. 

People in the U.S. may be familiar with the Covington sweetpotato, which Craig Yencho, a William Neal Reynolds Distinguished Professor of Horticulture, developed with Kenneth Pecota, a Senior Research Scholar in the Department of Horticulture.

But Yencho and Pecota have also developed other varieties with different traits such as different growing seasons and different pest and disease resistance for local and global growers. Having reliable early maturing varieties as well as later maturing varieties help farmers to balance their labor demands.

Yencho has worked in Africa for over 20 years and recently received a three-year, $15-million-dollar grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation as part of a multidisciplinary team of scientists led by the International Potato Center (CIP), to continue improving sweetpotatoes in Sub-Saharan Africa.

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