Canada: Prairie potato yields continue to rise

Potato storage sheds in Manitoba are full, thanks to blockbuster yields this fall. In fact, yields were so large that a portion of Manitoba’s potato crop is still in the ground. “Some people had yields they were just not anticipating,” said Dan Sawatzky, manager of the Keystone Potato Producers Association. “They ran out of storage space.” Consequently, about 1,300 acres of potatoes weren’t harvested this year in Manitoba out of 65,000 total acres. The average yield in the province was 350 hundredweight per acre, based on Statistics Canada estimates. Assuming the estimate is accurate, Manitoba growers will have shattered a record of 323 cwt. set last year. More