Worsening potato crisis: falling production and rising prices
The production difficulties that are affecting Europe as well as Italy increase the difficulty of finding raw materials and drive up prices
3' min read
3' min read
An indispensable commodity on the table, potatoes have also been hit in recent months by waves of price increases that threaten to undermine their primacy as the 'poor food' par excellence.
Year-on-year consumer prices on 30 September 2024 show an increase of 15 cents and skyrocketing production costs. For an import-dependent country such as Italy, extremely worrying signals are coming from Germany and France, marked by sharply declining production, and from Spain, which is forced to reduce exports to zero to meet domestic consumption.
The Spain case has also opened up a question: is this the beginning of a crisis for one of the most loved and 'taken for granted' commodities at the table?
Climate change, elaterids and (as far as Italy is concerned) the ban on the use of specific chemicals are undermining production. There is a shortage of raw material: 11 thousand (Unapa data) hectares of potato cultivation were lost, throughout Europe, in the last campaign alone. The most worrying trend belongs to the seed tuber sector: heavy rainfall has adversely affected both yields and health, causing large quantities of product to be downgraded or discarded. As if this were not enoughthe processing industry - which in OECD countries concentrates more than 60% of final consumption - represents a very fierce competitor. And it is precisely this segment that is configured as the most dynamic, also looking to the future. Projections - set against the backdrop of changing eating habits - indicate, at best, a 70% increase in demand by 2030. It goes without saying that many producers will prefer to convert to the more lucrative contracts offered by the industry.
Italy is totally dependent on imports of the seed tuber. Last year, according to Istat data, imports were close to 865 thousand tonnes (+33% over 2022), compared to exports of only 100 thousand.
