With a request to undertake urgent intervention on the potato market, a few days ago she asked the head of the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage Stefan Krajewski, the Agricultural Chamber of the Łódź Voivodeship. She noted that over a million tons of potatoes a year are produced in the Łódź Voivodeship, of which 40 percent. falls on the Sieradz poviat. Meanwhile – as she pointed out – this year's high yields and the increased area of potato cultivation led to overproduction at the national and European level. This, in turn, caused the collection of purchase prices.
Currently, wholesale prices of potatoes in the Sieradz poviat range from 25 groszy per kg, and in extreme cases they fall up to PLN 5 groszy per kg, i.e. PLN 50 per ton.
Currently, the wholesale price of potatoes in Broniszach ranges from 0.6 to 0.8 PLN/kg and It is about 40 percent lower than a year ago. In Warsaw stores and in the bazaars prices of these vegetables reach PLN 3 per kg.
Farmers want intervention purchase
Potato growers from the Łódź Voivodeship are primarily demanding activities stabilizing the market, considering the intervention of potatoes or subsidies for their storage. They pay attention to the need to increase transparency in the supply chain and monitoring of commercial margins.
Minister of Agriculture Stefan Krajewski, asked by PAP if the ministry is planning any help for potato producers, replied that the situation on all agricultural markets is difficult. “If we would like to pay extra from the state budget, then these payments would have to amount to up to several dozen billion zlotys. We know what we focus on today, the biggest money is spent on the armament of the Polish army and the security of Poland” – explained the minister. He pointed out that the support for these farmers is the possibility of obtaining a low -interest rate loan.
Andrzej Przepióra from the Wielkopolska Chamber of Agriculture explained the cause of low purchase prices. As he said, “the area of potato cultivation has increased (from 192,000 ha to over 200,000 ha), this is the aftermath of very good prices last year.” He noted that the high prices of specific agricultural products are a signal for farmers, for example, to deal with them. Farmers are looking for an alternative to cultivation of cereals, which have been cheap for several years. Another thing is this year's high potato yield not only in Poland, but also in other countries – noted Przepióra.
He added that the agricultural market is characterized by the fact that even a slight increase in supply or demand causes high jumps. He pointed out that agricultural prices need to be looked at multi -season, because they hesitate each year, once the producer will earn a lot, in another – he may lose. “And it depends on the farmer whether he will stick to one cultivation, optimizing costs or not. The producer who specializes in cultivation, it is much easier to cope with the breakdown of prices, and the novice – will suffer losses,” said Przepióra.
Potatoes for fries and chips in a better situation
He pointed out that farms specializing in the production of potatoes for fries or chips have a much smaller problem. These have connections with processing, have appropriate potato storage, they often operate in a producer group.
According to Przepiór, the wholesale price of a given product has no effect on the retail price. In the case of sale in stores, there are costs such as energy, mediation and transport. The price of raw material in the final product is about 11 percent. “With such a low share of raw material at the final price of the product, the price change in wholesale does not change the price in stores,” he said.
The problem with the sale of potatoes was confirmed by the wholesale market expert in Broniszach Maciej Kmera. “This year there is a large supply of potatoes, the prices are very low, there are a lot of potatoes on the market, farmers do not store them, because they have no place, hence they go a lot to the market right after the harvest” – explained the expert.
What do farmers think?
According to Kmera, many potatoes are badly stored or have pathogens, which is why in later months their quality decreases significantly and farmers want to get rid of them quickly. He emphasized that Mostly, farmers do not buy qualified seed potatoes for growingand use their own collections, which negatively affects their quality.
Poland is the fourth (after Germany, France and the Netherlands) producer of potatoes in the EU. In the country, potatoes are mainly grown in the Greater Poland, Łódź, Mazowieckie, Pomeranian and Kuyavian-Pomeranian voivodships.
