Should we expect to see potato prices soar in the coming weeks? The purchase price for supermarkets should in any case increase sharply in 2023.
Potato growers have it big on the potato. Exceptionally hot and dry, the year 2022 had very negative effects on their production.
“When it’s too hot, the potato goes into survival mode and stops growing,” explains Geoffroy D’Evry, president of the National Union of Potato Producers (UNPPT) interviewed by Midi Libre.
Result, as pointed out RMC, the average potato yield is at its lowest level for 27 years. Combined with the rise in energy prices – which has a greater impact on the industrial sector than on the fresh sector – this unfavorable weather has led professionals to estimate a 30% increase in purchasing costs for large retailers.
Reduction of surfaces
Will this inflation be passed on to consumers? Not necessarily according to Geoffroy D’Evry, who puts pressure on supermarkets.
“When you buy a potato at the supermarket, 47% of its value is captured by supermarkets, once morest only 20% by farmers,” he points out. “If mass distribution played the game better in terms of distribution, it might benefit producers and consumers alike.”
Especially since another threat hangs over the year 2023: that of insufficient production to meet the expected increase in demand. “Faced with the vagaries of the weather, and in particular the multiplication of heat waves which are detrimental to potato cultivation, some farmers tend to reduce production areas”, says Geoffroy D’Evry
If there is no question for the moment of talking regarding a potential shortage of potatoes, French potato production might well drop this year.
