Jerusalem Artichoke as a Strategic Crop for Solving Food Problems

Abstract

Jerusalem artichoke is a staple for the raw material base of healthy food, beverages, feed, medicine, and fuel, in addition to being the source of its herbage and tubers. The choice of conditions for cultivating a variety depends on the purpose or direction for the crop and the products obtained from it. This research involved laboratory and on-farm studies of 16 Jerusalem artichoke varieties of different maturity groups cultivated on sod-podzolic sandy loam soils to determine their suitability for further use in feed production. The list of varieties in question is presented in this work. The gross yield of tubers obtained from varieties with early leaf wilting was 33.1–51.1 t/ha, whereas that from varieties with late leaf wilting was 14.4–43.9 t/ha. The total yield of Jerusalem artichoke raw biomass was 36.8–98.1 t/ha. Moreover, early varieties had a dominant mass of tubers in the total feed value structure (68%), whereas herbage mass (59%) prevailed in the total feed value structure of varieties with late leaf wilting. The highest total solids in tubers (25.0–26.4%) were found in varieties Korenevskiy, Novost VIRa, and Blank Brekos; whereas high inulin content was found in varieties Dieticheskiy, Kaluzhskiy, Korenevskiy, Nakhodka, Novost VIRa, and Blank Brekos. The aggregate feed value amounted to 37.0–103.4 thousand MJ/ha of metabolized energy; this exceeded energy production costs on properly selected varieties by two- to three-fold. The data obtained can be useful for growers in the introduction and evaluation of Jerusalem artichoke varieties to be cultivated for further usage and processing, including fodder purposes.