In the season 2018/2019, China, the world's largest potato producer, will reduce the cultivation of this crop by 2% to 94 million tons.
This is stated in the report of the Foreign Agricultural Service of the US Department of Agriculture (FAS), the Internet portal reports), FruitNews Internet portal reports.
“The decline is due to a change in potato prices, which prompted many Chinese farmers to replace the unprofitable crop with corn,” the report says. In turn, the production of processed potatoes, in particular french fries, will increase by 15% compared to the same period last year to 290 thousand tons.
Potato imports in the season 2018/2019 are projected to decline by 10% to 115 thousand tons. The US Department of Agriculture experts call the main reasons for the drop in imports to be an increase in duties for American products, a reduction in EU supplies and an increase in domestic production.
Source: https://www.fruit-inform.com/