Is a Potato Shortage Affecting French Fries From Japan to Kenya?

This week, the Washington Submit reported {that a} “rising world potato scarcity” is affecting sellers and customers of French fries and chips (within the North American definition of the phrase) world wide, hitting such disparate locations as Japan and Kenya. However the story additionally reveals that the phrase “scarcity” may be doing the state of affairs brief shrift; it’s extra difficult than that.

The world’s high potato producers are, in descending order, China, India, Russia, Ukraine and the USA. However potatoes develop in many of the temperate world; there are numerous varieties, and vital quantities of potatoes are grown in Western Europe, Northern Africa and, in fact, in South America, the place they had been initially domesticated. Is there actually a scarcity of potatoes in all of those locations?

There’s a entire mess of issues within the potato business proper now. Canada, a serious producer, stopped exporting some potatoes to the USA owing to the invention of potato wart fungus in Prince Edward Island. A mixture of a harsh frost after which extreme rains decreased the provision of sure potato varieties in South Africa. 

[RELATED: Canada Halts Exports of Prince Edward Island Potatoes]

However most of the issues are as a consequence of very specific circumstances that aren’t, strictly talking, a scarcity of precise potatoes. In Japan, McDonald’s has made information for proscribing buy to solely the small measurement of French fries. However that’s not due to a scarcity of potatoes; it’s as a result of McDonald’s Japan makes use of fries imported from North America, which undergo the Port of Vancouver. That port skilled a disastrous flood in November, which precipitated an enormous backlog of container ships from which the provision chain continues to be recovering.

KFC in Kenya tweeted out that it’s “run out” of fries and is providing options. This attracted anger from potato farmers in Kenya, who produce greater than one million tonnes of potatoes per yr and who should not struggling any notable shortages this yr. KFC Kenya replied that the corporate’s high quality assurance process requires it to import potatoes, relatively than use native ones, and most of these come from Egypt. KFC mentioned that transport delays in Egypt owing to COVID-19-related issues are on the root of the scarcity in Kenyan KFCs. 

[RELATED: Supply Chain Crunches Are Affecting Every Corner of Agriculture]

In South Africa, potato chip provides are operating low, however is that as a consequence of a scarcity? Potatoes South Africa, a promotional company for the South African potato business, says that there isn’t a generalized scarcity, regardless of a few of the climate points the nation has confronted. As an alternative, the climate has been dangerous for just a few types of potato, resembling Mondial and Sifra, that are used disproportionately by producers like Lay’s to make potato chips. Potato costs truly hit uncommon highs and lows in South Africa, owing to the climate, however the total provide has been pretty steady.

Potatoes aren’t affected by a scarcity precisely, however the world potato business does appear to be struggling, as is many of the world agricultural commerce, from a scarcity of versatility.