News on The Potato Supply Chain from United Kingdom

Seed potato growers and traders are facing mounting frustration as wet weather continues to interrupt the harvest across Scotland.

Potato Farmers are reminded to consider safety during harvest, since incidents during the potato harvesting season remain a common cause of serious and fatal injury.

Tong’s market leading Caretaker mobile (potato) grader is now available with a new option of trailer reversing sensors, make loading the grader’s hopper much quicker, safer, easier and more accurate than ever before.

As the potato harvest in the United Kingdom progresses, there are increasing reports of widespread scab.

In Great Britain, Maris Piper is still by a wide margin the most grown potato variety. But potato growers have planted an increased area of emerging varieties to serve the fresh packing market

The Chinese Government and leading potato company, Xisen Potato Group have committed £3 million to a collaboration with James Hutton Limited (JHL) to breed new varieties and research resistance to pests and diseases, tuber storage and potato processing.

Government representatives from Scotland and Brazil met in July to simplify the import classification requirements for seed potatoes. The game-changing meeting was organised and funded by the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB).

In Scotland, a group of major potato businesses and public sector organisations have sponsored a £242,000 (USD 313,000) research project aimed at reducing the impact of potato disease blackleg on the Scottish seed potato industry.

Potato industry representatives, growers and influencers from all over the UK and beyond are expected to descend on Dundee to take part in Potatoes in Practice 2017, a technical potato field event featuring a high-standard mix of science, technology and practical advice and the largest of its type in the UK.

Nominations for the coveted ‘British Potato Industry Award’ and ‘AHDB Above and Beyond Award’ are now open.

Potato supplier Albert Bartlett (United Kingdom) has made its first entry into the sweet potato market with a listing at the British online retailer Ocado.

Seed potato growers for the United Kingdom who have been confident that crucial trade with Egypt and other non-EU markets would not be disrupted by Brexit may be in for a shock.

AHDB Potatoes Market Intelligence Analysts estimate the total area planted with potatoes in Great Britain this season is 121,000 hectares. This is up by four per cent on the previous year.

Scientists have identified a version of a single gene involved in the heat stress response that is more active in potato types that can tolerate high temperature, potentially providing potato breeders a tool to make potato varieties less vulnerable to increased temperature.

Tong Engineering is pleased to announce new design options on its popular Fieldloader, including unique automatic transport-mode features, allowing users to make the machine even more compact for road transport.

With six farms as shareholders of 3Ms (Three Musketeers) operating more than 34,000 acres, they have contracted Haith, Tomra and Dijkstra to put in a new state-of-the-art potato grading and sorting line at their site at Bentwaters, near Woodbridge, Suffolk. A brand new building for this has been constructed also.

Great Britain grower-held potato stock levels at the end of March 2017 were at 1Mt, around the same volume as the end-March 2016 and 300Kt less than the end-March 2015 according to an AHDB estimate.

DEFRA ha aprobado la solicitud del Laboratorio Sainsbury, Norwich, para llevar a cabo ensayos de campo con cultivo de papa genéticamente modificada (GM) en un sitio de ensayo designado en el Norwich Research Park entre 2017 y 2021.