October 4 2006, 12:26

Potato prices started decreasing in Ukraine

According to information provided by the specialists of "Agrooglyad: Vegetables and Fruits" journal, since the beginning of this week the rates of price decrease for potato has speeded up on Ukrainian market. To the opinion of most market players, rush demand for potato has given place to lower purchase activity from the side of many wholesale buyers.

The specialists explained this situation by several factors. First of all, weather conditions contributed to the timely harvesting process in the farms. In its turn, timely gathered harvest resulted in dynamic potato supply growth on market. Second, earlier the producers spoke about low potato yield based on the preliminary assessment (they also tried to escalate the situation and increase market prices). Now many farmers say that their potato harvest somewhat exceed the past year records.

Third, according to information provided by market players, the wholesale companies from the eastern and southern oblasts of Ukraine slowed down the rates of potato purchases from the producers of the western regions. The wholesalers found it difficult to sell previously purchased produce for the affordable prices. According to the specialists' forecasts, and judging from the market saturation with potato supplies, the potato prices will probably continue decreasing. The price growth is possible when potato from storages will start to be sold in winter period.

The price decrease was the most significant in the western oblasts: from $0.29-0.39/kg down to $0.23-0.27/kg in Zakarpattya and from $0.27-0.31/kg down to $0.19-0.23/kg in Ivano-Frankovsk oblast. The price decrease was also observed in the central regions where the potato quality was often not quite high. The price for potato has decreased in average $0.02-0.03/kg during this week.

The details of the price perspectives for potato in the period December 2006 till May 2007, as well as the forecast of potato production in 2007 will be presented by Andriy Yarmak, the Deputy Director of the Agricultural Marketing Project at the first day of the third international conference "Fruits and Vegetables of Ukraine 2006. Open Market". Not to miss the most important event of the produce business in the Eastern Europe, and in order to become the conference participant, please register online. We'll remark that at the present moment large national and foreign investors show interest to potato market in Ukraine; they also plan to actively participate in the conference.