Kartoffeln Cockpit, 02.11.2018

The PotatoCall reports in its October monthly report that at the end of September in North America, stocks of frozen potato products were at their lowest levels since their data collection. Harvesting problems in Wisconsin, Prince Edwards Island and North Dakota will make long-term storage a challenge in many places. Up to 40% of potatoes in Wisconsin should not be suitable for the production of products because the rainfall was raining. This year's production bottleneck in Europe would be a good way for the US potato industry to regain lost world market shares. But that does not seem to be possible for a variety of reasons. One of them is that the 2018 crop in North America not only yielded average yields because it was partly too dry during the summer and water rights were increasingly limited on Prince Edwards Island, but the weather was a challenge in many places during the harvest ,Since there was already a tight supply of raw materials in the US and Canada last year, large processors such as Cavendish, Simplot and McCain had offered more supply contracts and relocated production from Prince Edward Island to Manitoba and Alberta. If large quantities of raw materials are missing this year, efforts will have to be made to serve the national market alone. For the export of frozen chips from the USA, 18% of the total raw material has been used in recent years. In addition, European fry producers have been able to sell more and more potato products in the US and Canada, because the factories over there are usually located far inland and transport costs are high in the centers. The freight from Europe to the coastal towns was partly lower than that within America. The potato industry on the other side of the Atlantic also complains about various trade barriers to which they are exposed. These are partly phytosanitary reasons, tariffs and bureaucratic hurdles. Domestically, it is land and water rights that make it difficult to expand potato production. No one can say yet how to meet the raw materials bottleneck here and there. There are different strategies.As Belgium is particularly bad, it is worth taking a look there. Meanwhile, some factories have specialized in getting the most from even the most problematic raw material. They focus on the variety Bintje, which has some 30% glassy tubers. Nevertheless, you can not and do not want to do without the other 70% of these games. But as the potatoes will not last, hurry is required. The effort that is carried out here is expensive and must be compensated by correspondingly low cost prices. The producer association Fiwap has developed a quotation specifically for this purpose, which should meet this requirement. Cargoes containing more than 15% swimmers and the UWG does not reach 345 g were rated at 10 to 15 € / dt this week. Better games cost something between 18 and 25 € / dt. For other varieties and qualities continues to be noted 25 € / dt. Another strategy is to woo the new crop in 2019 as early as possible. Particularly active are Germany and Great Britain. However, there is also at least one fly in the ointment, because the bottleneck is low amounts of water in the reservoirs and scarce seeds.In Egypt there is sometimes a national uprising, because the supply of potatoes in their own country is scarce and prices rise up to 75 € / dt. The majority poor population calls on the state to do something against the monopoly of fewer providers.