Claim: Quinoa originated in the western hemisphere.

The Western Hemisphere is a geographical term for the half of the earth that lies west of the Prime meridian -LRB- which crosses Greenwich , UK -RRB- and east of the antimeridian , the other half being called the Eastern Hemisphere .   In this sense , the Western Hemisphere consists of the Americas , the western portions of Eurasia and Africa , the extreme eastern tip of Russia , numerous territories in Oceania , and a portion of Antarctica , while excluding some of the Aleutian Islands to the southwest of the Alaskan mainland .   In an effort to define the Western Hemisphere as the parts of the world which are not part of the Old World , there also exist projections which use the 20th meridian west and the diametrically opposed 160th meridian east to define the hemisphere . This projection excludes the European and African mainlands and a small portion of northeast Greenland , but includes more of eastern Russia and Oceania .   The center of the Western Hemisphere is located in the Pacific Ocean at the intersection of the 90th meridian west and the equator very close to the Gal % C3 % A1pagos .   The highest mountain in the Western Hemisphere is Aconcagua in the Andes of Argentina at 6960.8 m.