The potato value chain in the province of El-Oued, Algeria

The potato sector in Algeria is considered to be a strategic crop for the economic development, many levers have been put in place in recent years to increase yield levels, which have been quadrupled to 5 million tons.

A study, carried out in 2021 in the framework of the EU cooperation project PASA, focuses on the analysis of the sector at the level of the province of El-Oued (South-East Algeria), an important region in terms of potato production as about half of the national production is done here.

This study aims to establish an inventory of the sector through a macroeconomic and political analysis with a particular focus on all the stakeholders in the sector, emphasizing the development opportunities of the local market as well as export ones.

At the end of this study, the actions to support the sector suggested by the authors revolve around the links between production, marketing and processing to contribute to the sector's development and food security in the country.

Many challenges remain to be addressed for the future, particularly on the aspects related to the modernization of the sector through the expertise and know-how of the leading countries in this field, in this case the Netherlands.

In 2020 RVO published a study on the potato sector in the north of Algeria. Both studies are complementary as they cover different production regions.