Not every potato grower in the United States has signed a contract for his chips potatoes yet. Some processors are still negotiating with growers, depending on the growing region. In the meantime, planting has already started carefully, or is about to start. Growers speak of their most expensive potato crop ever.
The three major potato processors in the Columbia Basin region (Washington and Oregon) have all finalized their agreements with growers. These are Lamb Weston, McCain Foods and JR Simplot. The area is good for almost 73.000 hectares of potatoes. That is more than the entire consumption potato area in the Netherlands.
In Idaho – the second largest growing area in the US – two of the three major factories have made their agreements. In many other states, negotiations between grower organizations and factories are still ongoing. This also applies to Canada, where not all agreements have yet been made. In the province of Alberta it is, but not yet in Manitoba and Prince Edward Island (PEI), among others.
Contract price increases 20%
On average, according to insiders, contract prices have increased by 20% compared to 2021. In the American states of Texas and Nebraska, potato growers have now started planting potatoes. The temperature is slightly lower than average, but the conditions are good. Planting will soon start in the major growing areas.
Potato growers on Prince Edward Island have the major shortcoming this season that exporting is not possible after the discovery of a dreaded wart disease. A large part of the harvest is normally delivered to the US, but not this year. At the end of November, the Canadian NVWA restricted exports. Exporting to Puerto Rico became possible in February and after an announcement from the USDA at the end of March, the border to the American continent will open very soon.
Canadian potatoes destroyed
The export ban came at a very bad time for the island. The harvest was extremely good last fall, in stark contrast to colleagues in Central and Western Canada. The islanders normally export 122.000 tons of ware potatoes and 6.600 tons of seed potatoes to the US every year. Processor Lamb Weston purchased potatoes from the island, but the government was a major customer. They withdrew and destroyed 152.500 tons. On March 1, the chip potato stock was almost 40% higher than a year earlier. The table potato stock was even double.