Holanda: "Hopefully new potato season will be better"

It hasn’t been positive, particularly for the growers. Ultimately nobody benefits from such low prices. Now the price of the old potatoes is increasing somewhat, but that’s still mainly for the industry," John Groeneweg says.

"I thought the prices of the first auction were still a bit low compared to previous years. Due to the drought, there’s not much growth in the potatoes. The forecasts were lower. Perhaps they should have waited another week with the auction, but hindsight is always 20/20," John observes. He doubts whether such a low potato price as last year stimulates consumption. "I have been growing along with my clients these past years. I don’t think this has to do with the low potato price."The potato trader sees that the special potatoes are becoming more and more popular with the consumer. "They call them luxury potatoes, but personally I think a potato that’s been available for years is just as luxurious as, say, a La Ratte potato. As long as the potato has been grown on the right soil. Purple and red-fleshed potatoes might look nice and people are susceptible to that, but in practice people don’t eat a potato like that on a daily basis. Those mainly find their way to the restaurant business."

"We’re in a region here where Eigenheimers still sell well, but there are regions where not even a kilo of it is sold anymore. You’re also seeing that they try to replace the Bildstar here and there with other red varieties. People don’t want Bintjes anymore, so they go for the Frieslander, which is really a summer variety, although it’s stored longer now," John sums up the developments. "What matters in the end is that the potato has flavour, and is good under the skin as well. That starts with the cultivation, and has to be assured throughout the chain. Here and there things go wrong in that respect, which puts the entire sector in a bad light."