Economic importance of sweet potato in the Philippines

Sweet potato is native to Central America and later spread to the Philippines by the Spanish. It is one of the most widely grown crops in the Philippines. There are two main reasons why sweet potatoes are widely grown in the Philippines. One is because sweet potatoes can be grown at any time of the year. Sweet potatoes require the least amount of fertilizer and other farm inputs compared to other crops. Second, the Philippines has facilitated sweet potato production both economically and environmentally. As an important food and cash crop in the Philippines, economic importance of sweet potato in the Philippines is self-evidance.

Sweet potato

Economic importance of sweet potato in the Philippines reflects on its uses, sweet potato mainly for household consumption and industrial use in the Philippines. Sweet potatoes are mainly used for food in household consumption, while households also rely on sweet potato sales to meet their economic needs. About 30% of sweet potatoes are harvested and sold to local markets,  farmers' communities or starch processing plant. But the most important use of sweet potatoes in the Philippines is for starch production, which in turn can be used as a raw material for the production of alcohol, glue or syrup for industrial purposes, such as starch used in the textile or paper industry.

Sweet potato &sweet potato starch

As a human food, sweet potatoes have not received sufficient attention, especially among Asians. However, in recent years, as the world is facing population growth and increased food demand, people are increasingly interested in sweet potatoes, and the production of sweet potatoes has attracted considerable attention in some countries. Because one hectare of sweet potato can feed more people, so sweet potato is considered a valuable crop to solve the problem of hunger in the world. Therefore economic importance of sweet potato in the Philippines gradually gain more recognition. Sweet potato has good drought tolerance and can produce a large amount of dry matter per hectare under adverse conditions. In some countries, the national average yield of sweet potatoes has reached 20 tons per new hectare, of which dry matter accounts for 30% to 40%. As a high-yielding crop, sweet potato plays an important role in responding to the food shortage of population growth.

Sweet potato in the Philippines

Economic importance of sweet potato in the Philippines also reflects on sweet potato starch production. Sweet potato starch production not only improves the economic value of sweet potatoes, but also bring more economic benefits to the Philippines, meanwhile it promotes the development of the starch industry. Philippine sweet potato starch production has gradually transitioned from traditional manual production to modern machinery production. Traditional manual sweet potato starch production just use a simple to grating cassava after manual washing. And then a sedimentation tank is used to separate the starch and impurities, but the starch is exposed to the air and easily causes secondary pollution, which cannot guarantee the quality of the starch. The modern equipment production adopts a closed full-cyclone process to refine the starch slurry to ensure that the starch is free from pollution. At the same time, the multi-stage cyclone is used in parallel to effectively remove impurities, and the quality and whiteness of the starch quality is guaranteed to meet high requirements. Moreover, unlike the traditional natural drying which is easily affected by the weather season, the modern airflow flash dryer can dry the starch in only a few seconds, and the processing volume is large and the floor space is small. In addition, the material in contact with the equipment is made of food grade stainless steel to ensure the quality of the starch. The production of modern equipment not only greatly improves the production efficiency of sweet potato starch, but also guarantees the quality of sweet potato starch, so that sweet potato starch can be applied not only to the less demanding feed, textile and other industries, but also to the food industry and the highly standard medical industry.

Modern mechinical sweet potato starch processing

The Philippines is an important sweet potato producer and consumer country, and sweet potato and sweet potato starch have contributed to the economic growth of the Philippines. With the increasing demand for the starch industry in the world, the quality requirements for starch are getting higher and higher, so it is necessary to use professional sweet potato starch equipment to produce sweet potato starch. Doing Company is a professional manufacturer of starch processing equipment. Our equipment is advanced in technology and high in automation. If you are interested in sweet potato starch production, welcome to contact us.