This year, excessive rainfall has not done much damage to potato growers. Excess moisture was observed mainly in the south, while in central Ukraine there was a drought.

However, thanks to mutual compensation, there will be no shortage of potatoes this year, said Nikolay Gordiychuk, director of Agrico Ukraine, a market leader in seed potatoes imported and grown in Ukraine, to EastFruit.

“We saw excessive moisture this year mainly in the south. Yes, this entailed a lot of losses due to sick potatoes. The price fell to 4-3 UAH / kg. By that time, the entire South was digging, and the agrarians were trying to quickly sell these potatoes.

In central Ukraine, there was no such excessive amount of moisture during the growing season. This region, on the other hand, has suffered a little from the drought, so this year the harvest here is slightly lower. However, the harvest in these regions is offset by a sufficient harvest in Western Ukraine, where farmers harvest up to 50 tons / ha. I think we will have potatoes this year,” says Nikolay Gordiychuk.

“This year, the harvesting of potatoes has shifted by almost two weeks, this is due to the rains in September. Some farms were forced to stop work for almost 10 days. Now everyone is actively trying to dig up the potatoes as quickly as possible and put them in storage.

If the weather permits and there will be another 10-15 sunny days, we will have potatoes. If there are prolonged rains or early frosts, it may be that there will be a shortage of potatoes,” adds the director of the “Agrico Ukraine” company.

EastFruit