Potatoes in Poland- is demand reviving?

The wholesale potato trade on the Polish market clearly slowed down in February and we saw a stagnant situation. The warm weather was to blame for much of this. According to potato wholesalers, demand for potatoes weakened after the outbreak of war in Ukraine. It was only in the last few days that the interest in these vegetables in the Polish wholesale market has twitched and improved slightly.

The question is whether this isn't the beginning of a trend of increasing demand for potatoes. A trend that potato producers would find very useful. Even if this does not lead to price rises, but rather to a reduction in price pressure. If, on the other hand, prices were to strengthen before April, this would be welcomed by growers.

For the time being, potato prices at the large wholesalers have remained fairly stable. Since the beginning of February, if there have been any changes, they have not affected the average price level. In other words, more transactions have probably taken place at lower prices, but the upper limits of the ranges have not been lowered. Only the upper limits of the price ranges have changed recently. Selling prices for yellow potatoes, calibre 45+, in bags are most commonly at PLN 0.53-0.80/kg, red at PLN 0.60-0.87/kg and white at PLN 0.67-0.93/kg.

As can be seen in the graph above, the average price of yellow potatoes (0.68 PLN/kg) remains more or less in the middle of the average rate of the previous decade. It is far from the record highs of March 2019 and 2020 (around PLN 1 per kilo), but is still significantly higher than last year's level (PLN 0.38/kg).