The interruption in the supply of British potatoes to the Canary Islands due to the appearance of a pest in the crops of the United Kingdom, the Colorado beetle, and the uncertainty about how long this suspension could last has raised fears of a possible shortage in the islands.
The United Kingdom is the archipelago's main potato supplier. According to data from the Canarian Institute of Statistics (ISTAC), 86.37% of the vegetables, plants, roots, and food tubers that the autonomous community imported in 2022 originated from the UK. In fact, according to Juan Luis Pulido, president of the Association of Distributors of Potatoes for Planting and Cultivation of Las Palmas (ADIPA), England provides a huge amount of potatoes and it won't be possible to replace them with potatoes from other countries in the coming weeks.
"We never thought this would happen," stated Pulido, who claims he's never seen anything like this in the more than 50 years he's been working in the sector. “Right now we're looking for potatoes in as many markets as we can. But it's complicated."
The Canarian government announced on Monday that it will seek to replace the loss of the British supply with potatoes from other countries such as Israel, Cyprus, Egypt, Libya, or Malta. An authorized source of the Autonomous Executive also said they could bring the product from Wales. The intention, the same source continues, is to find alternatives even within the United Kingdom, so they're also investigating the markets of Scotland and Northern Ireland.
The order of March 12, 1987, which establishes the Canary Islands' phytosanitary rules relating to the import, export, and transit of vegetable products, allows the archipelago to carry out searches for potatoes in all the nations mentioned above, in addition to Syria, Tunisia, and Algeria.
The Canarian harvest falls by 60%
England's decision could give wings to the island's local potato production. This year, however, in addition to the damage inflicted by the plague of the Guatemalan moth, which has persisted in the autonomous community since 1999, extreme weather conditions, with episodes of high temperatures and torrential rains at unexpected times, have destabilized the potato cycle. Canarian farmers have revealed that up to 60% of the harvest has been lost because of the drought. In addition, they won't start sowing the new crops until next month, which means they would have to wait for the harvest until new year.
Source: eldiario.es