'I'd rather have a futures market than a stock exchange listing'

The pool price for APF-Eriva is €20 without pre-sale and €22,50 with pre-sale upon delivery in week 13. For the export-ready Agria, there is an additional €3 surcharge. For Agria, the surcharge for processing is €2,50. For Innovator, the surcharge is €1,25, and for Fontane, €1,25 is deducted from the base price.

The average pool price from 2015 through 2024 without advance sales is €20,31. With advance sales, it's €18,97. The five-year averages are €22,36 and €21,33, respectively.

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"The sales season didn't go as planned, and I can't say it went smoothly," says Michel van Oijen of APF-Eriva. "The potato yield was lower than average, and as a result, it looked like it would be a season where prices would be around contract levels. Prices rose in late December and January. Then we briefly wondered: had we been completely wrong? Later, we started to slide downward. At one point, even factories started offering their previously contracted potatoes."

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"For a well-functioning market, I consider the lack of a functioning futures market a deficiency," Van Oijen continues. "The absence of a futures market doesn't make things any easier for us as a pool. You lack a benchmark and a reference point for doing business." According to Van Oijen, a well-functioning futures market is even more important than a representative Dutch potato listing. "From my experience with onions, I know that doing business on a stock exchange listing is risky. You can already increase the price of a single crate of potatoes. If a price is being paid somewhere, farmers will know about it immediately. There's no need for a listing committee for that."

Although it was a bumpy sales season, growers were not dissatisfied with the presentation of the pool price. "The APF pool has been running for 35 years now, and we know the ropes. Good clay potatoes remain popular with the industry. A pool remains an attractive sales method for growers."