News on Potato Stats, Trade, Prices from India

Aiming to boost potato exports, the Indian government is considering identifying ‘pest-free zones’ for the staple in production clusters of the growing states like Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal.

Potato farmers in Gujarat are a happy lot this year, as they are getting better prices for their produce despite 15% increase in potato production.

In the Indian State of Assam ten onion- and potato retailers have been arrested because they charged a price for their vegetables above the legal limit.

India's potato exports jumped more than two-fold during April-December period of this fiscal to 2.5 lakh tonnes.

Even though the ban by West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on sale of potatoes to other states over the past three years has been lifted, cases of farmer suicides, which some say may have been driven by the fear of heavy losses, are still being reported.

The Government of India has stepped up taking measures, well in advance, to avoid any situation of abnormal increase prices of onion and potato.

A bumper crop, coupled with weak demand from other States, has led to a free-fall in potatoes prices in West Bengal.

The Indian government has decided to remove the minimum export price of potato as its availability has increased and prices have eased in domestic markets.

Domestic potato production in India in the present Rabi season is likely to be 25-30 per cent higher over last year on account of good weather conditions.

After earning high profits last year, potato growers in India are selling the crop at a small margin this year.

Indian Potato chip, fries and flake manufacturers have urged the government to waive the 30% import duty on potato to improve supplies and check soaring prices at home.

Farmers and cold storage owners in India (Agra, UP) have lauded the decision to lift the ban on import of seed potatoes.

Potato supply from West Bengal was disrupted again with the authorities of the neighbouring state re-imposing transport restrictions from today (August 24, 2014), a week after Trinamool Congress (TMC) government there relaxed movement of this vegetable variety to Odisha.

To prevent rising prices of potato in the state, the West Bengal government has decided to continue a ban on its transportation to other states and abroad until normal situation was restored.

Potato prices are rising in North India due to a lack of supply

The Narendra Modi government (India) on Tuesday decided to bring onions and potatoes under the Essential Commodities Act (ECA) to curb black marketing and hoarding, blamed for recent surge in prices. This will empower states to impose caps on stocks of these two vegetables for traders.

Fries, chips and flakes manufacturers in India are concerned over firm prices of potato, which has seen a jump owing to poor crop this year. Companies assure that an increase in retail price was unlikely to take place in the short run.

The price of potato in some markets in India has jumped 25 per cent in the past four days, due to reports of massive damage of the harvested crop from inclement weather.