US importing more potatoes

US volume of imports of dehydrated, fresh, frozen, chips and seed potatoes are up 7% for July 2016 – March 2017 compared to the same period the previous year, according to Potatoes USA.  The organization says the increase of 2.5 million  hundredweight (cwt) fresh weight equivalent (fwe) was due to increases in all products except seed potatoes. The increase was led by fresh potatoes, which were up 17% or 940,173 cwt.  Imports of dehydrated potatoes increased 6% or 370,160 fwe cwt while frozen imports were up 1.14 million fwe cwt or 5%. Canada supplies all of the fresh potatoes and the vast majority of frozen products, while the dehy comes from a number of different sources including Canada, the EU, China and Peru. (Source: Potatoes USA)