Alexey Krasilnikov, executive director of the Potato Union, specially for the "Rossiyskaya Gazeta"
- This year the cost of potatoes has remained practically unchanged since January. In the wholesale potatoes now cost only 16-17 rubles. In retail, shoppers have also experienced low prices at a time when potato prices tend to rise.
The fact is that retail chains purchased significant quantities of imported goods. And for the first time in recent years, they went to Russia in January, while usually foreign deliveries began in the second half of February.
If last year 326 thousand tons of potatoes were brought from Russia to Egypt over the entire season, then this year 316 thousand tons were imported by May. At the same time, the peak of imports falls on June and July.
It can be assumed that about half a million tons of Egyptian potatoes have already been imported into Russia. As a result, there was a surplus of goods on the market.
A week ago, I saw packaged potatoes from last year's harvest in stores. Although in previous years in July such a potato was no longer on the market. Paradoxical facts were even noted when one of the largest federal networks offered Russian farms to take Egyptian potatoes for processing and sale.
As a result, the import trade networks have hurt themselves by purchasing huge quantities. There were enough domestic tubers on the market, and in order to let the imported tubers pass, the prices for early potatoes had to be reduced as much as possible. The networks did not receive any high margin.
More potatoes have been planted this year than last year. But in general, the harvest will be at the level of last year - about 20 million tons. Part of unsold marketable potatoes last year went to seeds. And this reduces the yield of potatoes.
Source: https://rg.ru