Growing Food: A Guide to Food Production

Taro

Colocasia spp.

Taro (French); Kolokasie (German); Malanga Islena (Spanish); Kechalo Pakistani
(Pashtu); Assipi (Angola)

The taro, dasheen, eddoe, cocoyam (“old” and “new”), malanga, tania, elephant
ear, etc. are all members of the large botanical arum-lily family the Araceae, or
“Aroids” or “Arum”, with about 100 genera and 1500 species found throughout the
world. Farmers have selected these useful plants since prehistoric times, each type
being adapted to grow well in certain parts of Asia, Africa, Oceania or Latin
America.

6 million MT per annum.

them often depend on the country—in West Africa for example the name
“Cocoyam” is used for both Colocasia and Xanthosoma species. In the Pacific, most
of the species on the table below are known as “Taro”. This table includes only the
most important species of Aroids:

Species (spp.) Common Names Comment

Asian Origin

1.Alocasia macrorrhiza

2.Alocasia indica

3.Colocasia esculenta

var. esculenta

4.Colocasia esculenta

var. antiquorum

(=var. globulifera)

5.Cyrtosperma

chamissonis

Giant Taro,Ta’amu, Ape

Sometimes

considered the same

species as 1)

Dasheen, Taro, Eddoe,

Cocoyam

Eddoe, Dasheen (Asia

and Pacific),

Elephant

Ear, Akhi (Hindi)

Giant Swamp Taro

1. 3-4m tall; Stem
   above ground is
   eaten


2. 2m tall. Important in
   India

described in the

text below

5. 3-4m tall; Tubers up
   to 60 kg after ten
   years
   South American Origin
   1.Xanthosoma
   atrovirens
   2.X. sagittifolium
   3.X. violaceum
   4.X. brasilense

All four of these species

are known as

Tannia, Tanier,

Yautia or (new)

Cocoyam

mainly in Puerto

Rico

2. Makes good “fufu”


3. Large plants, tubers
   of little food value


4. Only the leaves are
   eaten

T he Aroids are an important food crop in many parts of the humid tropics, such
as the Pacific, West Indies and West Africa. Global production is estimated at about

T hey are grown mainly for their edible corms or cormels—a “corm” is a short,
solid, swollen underground stem which lasts for about one year; the next years corm
grows at the top of, or close to, the old corm. A “cormel” is a corm which arises
vegetatively from a parent corm.
T here is great confusion and disagreement among botanists and agri-
culturalists about the classification of the Aroids. The common names used for

215

Species 3. and 4. are

GROWING FOOD – THE FOOD PRODUCTION HANDBOOK

1. Yellow tubers; found