Anuário Brasileiro de Hortaliças 2017 - page 32

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potatoes
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Potatogrowersharvestedasmallercropinthefirsthalfof2016,butthetotal is
biggerthanlastyearbecauseofthegoodperformanceinthesecondhalfoftheyear
T
he Brazilian potato crop was
also adversely affected by the
phenomenonknownas El Niño,
in 2016, but the year came to a
closewith a bigger volume than
in the previous years. The total potato crop
remained between 3.2 million and 3.4 mil-
lion tons, according to agronomic engineer
Paulo Popp, agricultural consultant in Curi-
tiba (PR). The volume outstripped by 6% to
8% the average of other normal years. The
area devoted to potatoes reached from 115
thousand hectares to 120 thousand hect-
ares, up 10% from the previous season. Ac-
cording toPopp, the sizeof the cropand the
planted area didnot reach the desired aver-
age for the first half of 2016 and 2017. How-
ever, in the second half of 2016 both were
much higher. “The main reason lies in the
fact that in both periods plenty of seed po-
tatoes were available”, he comments.
According to the consultant, plantings
in late 2015 and early 2016 were limited
by the greatly unfavorable weather condi-
tions triggeredby theEl Niñophenomenon,
which equally is to blame for the shortage
of high quality seed potatoes. “This fact
kept priceshigh for a longperiod, encourag-
ing the farmers, even non-traditional ones,
to invest in this crop”, he clarifies. None-
theless, from the moment the seed pota-
to stocks got back to normal, the size of the
cropwent upandprices began toplummet.
In the consultant’s view, up until May
2017, it was impossible to foresee how the
crop would behave in the second half of
the year. During the first months in 2017,
weather conditions were favorable and the
potato fields were performing well even in
regions where the crop is not expressive.
“It was one of the best summer crop, also
known as humid weather crop, in the past
30
Excellentcropandlowprices
markedthefirstmonths in2017
Inor Ag. Assmann
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