TRADE AND MARKETING Filipinos in search of varieties for growing their own crisp potatoes toes much more expensive than transport by land, as on the island of Luzon. A lot of foreign aid In the past thirty years, potato cultivation on the Philippines has received a lot of foreign aid, both from Germany and the Netherlands. Peru has mainly provided information from the CIP International Potato Centre and the Netherlands has given training during the International Potato Course in Wageningen. Both islands have institutes of the Phillipine Ministry of Agriculture working on rapid multiplication. For a fee, they make mini tubers and cuttings available to ‘specialised’ seed potato growers. They cultivate the second growth of the planting stock in plastic greenhouses. By far the largest part of the seed consists of small tubers from the previous harvest which have been stored for approximately eight months, either in the dark or otherwise. When a grower is not happy about his seed, he will go in search of better fields, which are usually found at seed potato growers higher up in the mountains. The most popular variety for the fresh market is the Granola, a wellknown variety from the Dutch merchant house Den Hartigh. In addition, varieties such as Conchita, Cosima, Red Pontiac and Solibao are also popular. Igorota, a variety from Vietnam, can be grown for both the fresh and the processing markets and that provides opportunities for growing potatoes for the processing industry. High production costs Despite the low wages - a day labourer earns less than one euro a day – the production costs of the potato are high. Costs are approximately 30 euros per 100 kilograms. The reason is the relatively expensive seed, the use of chemicals to control diseases such as Phytophthora, and labour costs, because work is mostly done by hand. The average sales price ex farm is approximately 35 euros per 100 kilograms, and in the supermarkets, consumers pay between 50 eurocents per kilogram for baby potatoes and 1.20 euros for the larger-sized potatoes in small plastic bags. The imported potatoes for local crisps manufacturing cost about 32 euros per 100 kilograms CIF Manilla, plus 40 percent import tax. At first sight, it seems that the locallygrown potato has to compete with the imported one. However, local chip manufacturers such as UCR and Liwayway do not buy local potatoes on contract because of the lower quality and the uncertainty as far as the supply is concerned. Replace import by home-grown potatoes At the moment, Wageningen University is studying the possibility of gradually replacing the annually-imported 20,000 tons of fresh potatoes for the crisps industry by potatoes grown on the island of Mindanao. They are going for crisps, because that is a smaller market than that of deep-frozen chips. Moreover, a crisp industry based on imported potatoes already exists, which is not the case as far as chips are concerned. Furthermore, it is easier to fulfil the requirements for crisps than for chips. The island of Mindanao has preference over an island such as Luzon, for example, because it has more potential potato fields and it is easier to expand the crop. Wageningen University wants to check out whether it is ultimately possible to use Dutch seed. That would mean that, in the long run, the Filipinos will only have to import 2,000 tons of seed annually instead of 20,000 tons of crisp potatoes. Together with the Philippines Ministry of Agriculture and the trade and industry sector, a task group will weigh up whether these plans can eventually be transformed into action. ● Institutes of the Phillipines Ministry of Agricuture are working on rapid multiplication. For a fee, they make mini tubers and cuttings available to ‘specialised’ seed potato growers. Potato World 2010 • number 2 33 Pagina 32
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