BAKU, Azerbaijan, Apr. 9
By Ilkin Seyfaddini – Trend:
Uzbekistan plans to grow about 2.8 million tons of potatoes in 2020 to meet domestic needs, Trend reports citing the Uzbek Agriculture Ministry.
"One of the main reasons for the shortage of potatoes in our markets is the panic mood of the population, which buys this product beyond its needs. This leads to a natural shortage of potatoes that are delivered to our markets every day," the report says.
Since the last ten days of March 2020, the southern regions of the country have started to ship early potato to the domestic market. From 15 April a large number of potatoes will arrive, including about 70,000 tons in April and 85,000 tons in May.
"A potato deficit of 45,000-50,000 tons mainly occurred in the period from March through April. During this period, domestic consumption is largely satisfied by stocks and imports from abroad. For the winter-spring season 2019-2020, 181,000 tons of potatoes were stored, and to date 133,000 tons have been sold. On average, 1,800 tons of potatoes are produced daily from warehouses. This is an average of 40 percent of daily consumer demand - 4,500 tons," the report says.
In addition, 130,000 tons of potato products were imported from Russia, Kazakhstan, Pakistan and Belarus from January through March 2020, including more than 60,000 tons in March. Imports will continue until Uzbekistan begins mass cultivation of potatoes.
By comparison, 283,000 tons of consumer potatoes were imported in 2019.
---
Follow author on Twitter: @seyfaddini
