As far as agriculture goes, potato growers Grant County, Wash., are in a pretty sweet spot. The task moving forward is finding ways to stay in the sweet spot, said Chris Voigt, executive director of the Washington State Potato Commission (WSPC).
Most Washington potatoes are grown for the processing market. Ninety percent of potatoes grown in the state become ingredients, processed into french fries, hash browns and similar products, Voigt said.
However, on a per-capita basis, U.S. residents are eating fewer potatoes overall, a trend that dates back about 15 years. Research shows potato consumption is down “because people just aren’t cooking,” said Voigt. “It turns out children are the crucial factor in potato consumption. People eat [more] potatoes when there are kids.”
Potato production hasn’t changed much in that span because the country’s population is still increasing due to immigration. Potato acreage in the state in any given year is between 170,000 and 175,000 acres.
Because Grant County growers can grow more potatoes on less ground than other growers across the country, the county is kind of isolated from some market pressure, Voigt said. Processors take all the potatoes county growers can produce, he said, and for the foreseeable future, Grant County growers will have a market.
But while the U.S. market is flat, worldwide demand is growing, Voigt said. “Now we have to play in the international market.”
American potato growers have reliable customers in Asia and were building up that market until the slowdown at U.S. ports in late 2014 and early 2015. The slowdown was tied to a labor dispute between the unions representing some port workers and the agencies that operate the ports.
The slowdown left tons of produce, from potatoes to apples to hay, stranded on docks up and down the West Coast. In the case of potatoes, European growers filled the gap.
“It’s difficult [to get those customers back],” Voigt said. But American marketers are focusing their efforts in the Pacific Rim countries.
The American market is affected by concerns about the nutritional value of potatoes, but that’s a less important factor than the change in cooking habits, Voigt said. Potato marketers in Washington and across the U.S. are working and have worked to turn that nutritional message around. That was one reason behind Voigt’s 60-day experiment five years ago where he ate only potatoes.
“If you were to believe all the myths out there, I’d be dead,” he said.
But he lost weight, and his blood sugar and cholesterol levels dropped. “I literally got healthier eating just potatoes for 60 days.”
A just-potato diet didn’t include any of the fatty acids necessary to good health, he said, “so I had to eat potato chips and french fries to make my diet healthier.”
The 60 days of potatoes attracted attention all over the world. “It went viral, and I did over 300 interviews,” Voigt said.
Source: Columbia Basin Herald