The Dutch and Belgian chip industry doubled the export of frozen chips to New Zealand in the second quarter of this year. The local potato industry down under is not happy about this.
The potato organization reports this Potatoes New Zealand (PNZ) in their September trading report. The fries from the Netherlands and Belgium arrived in New Zealand in the first week of October. The country is relatively a small player on the potato market. According to the report, imports of fries from Belgium and the Netherlands amounted to just over 500 tons in July. This does have an impact on the local industry, PNZ emphasizes.
The organization points out that the average export price of chips entering New Zealand remains relatively flat at a level of US$850 per tonne. And while the global price of Dutch and Belgian fries supplied to other parts of the world will rise to around $1.000 in July to cope with rising inflation. In other words, PNZ concludes, this is a case of dumping by the Dutch and Belgian potato industries on the New Zealand market. The organization also points to the 'significant' inflation that its own potato industry has to deal with.
Growth of exports to Southeast Asia
The New Zealand potato industry fears that it will have to lose market share due to higher imports and will be faced with eroded margins. As a boost, the sector is seeing encouraging results in the export of New Zealand frozen potato products. This grew by 28% in the second quarter of this year. The growth in exports of New Zealand potato products is mainly due to Southeast Asia, with Thailand, the Philippines, Malaysia and Indonesia being the largest buyers. Australia remains the biggest customer for New Zealand with exports of 31.400 tonnes over the last XNUMX months.