The main share of seed material for potatoes, which is grown in the Astrakhan region, is supplied by Russian seed enterprises. Andrey Timofeev, Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Fishing Industry of the region, spoke about this. Only 10% of potato varieties are grown today using seeds from foreign suppliers, the Arbuz online publication reports.
Recall that the Astrakhan region is one of the largest producers of potatoes in the Russian market. The uninterrupted operation of large processing enterprises that supply finished products to fast food chains, restaurant chains and are engaged in the production of chips depends on the supplies of local farmers. For example, the Astrakhan company "MAPS" (Enotaevsky district) works with large potato processors. This year, the area under potatoes is going to be increased.
With seeds for other crops, things are not so optimistic, since dependence on supplies from EU countries remains extremely high. Despite the fact that currently there are no bans on the import of seeds from the EU to Russia, Astrakhan farmers are considering China as an alternative supplier to replace European products.