Dear Readers, I often receive requests related to global potato statistics from industry folks around the world. The most authoritative – and for that matter the only – source that I am aware of in this regard, is the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). FAO maintains a databasis on many different crops, named FAOSTAT. It provides free access to food and agriculture data for over 245 countries and territories and covers all FAO regional groupings from 1961 to the most recent year available.
FAOSTAT provides a powerful search facility that users can employ and manipulate to obtain data about a chosen crop, although the results can be somewhat overwhelming to some extent. I extracted data for the potato crop related to “production” and “area harvested”, and present the results in the tables below (for 130 countries where potatoes are cultivated). The latest FAOSTAT data available is for 2018.
Readers can of course visit the FAOSTAT website and perform their own searches of the database as preferred – the English version can be accessed here: http://www.fao.org/faostat/en/#data
Please note: The FAOSTAT data presented here might not exactly correlate with the official data provided by government and/or industry organizations for some countries, but it should be close enough.
Potato production (FAOSTAT, 2018) – metric tonnes
World total: 368,168,914 tonnes
1. China | 90,259,155 |
2. India | 48,529,000 |
4. Ukraine | 22,503,970 |
5. Russian Federation | 22,394,960 |
6. United States of America | 20,607,342 |
7. Bangladesh | 9,744,412 |
8. Germany | 8,920,800 |
9. France | 7,870,973 |
10. Poland | 7,478,184 |
11. Netherlands | 6,029,734 |
12. Belarus | 5,865,123 |
13. Canada | 5,790,838 |
14. Iran | 5,321,188 |
15. Peru | 5,121,110 |
16. United Kingdom | 5,028,000 |
17. Egypt | 4,896,476 |
18. Algeria | 4,653,322 |
19. Pakistan | 4,591,776 |
20. Turkey | 4,550,000 |
21. Kazakhstan | 3,806,992 |
22. Brazil | 3,688,029 |
23. Colombia | 3,107,580 |
24. Nepal | 3,088,000 |
25. Belgium | 3,045,443 |
26. Romania | 3,022,758 |
27. Uzbekistan | 2,911,933 |
28. North Korea | 2,500,000 |
29. South Africa | 2,467,724 |
30. Argentina | 2,340,103 |
31. Japan | 2,261,945 |
32.Spain | 2,010,933 |
33. Kenya | 1,870,375 |
34. Morocco | 1,869,149 |
35. Denmark | 1,806,766 |
36. Mexico | 1,802,592 |
37. Tanzania | 1,768,154 |
38. Kyrgyzstan | 1,446,610 |
39. Nigeria | 1,363,358 |
40. Italy | 1,307,598 |
41. Indonesia | 1,284,762 |
42. Australia | 1,188,655 |
43. Chile | 1,183,357 |
44. Bolivia | 1,160,940 |
45 Malawi | 1,125,874 |
46. Tajikistan | 964,644 |
47. Azerbaijan | 898,914 |
48. Rwanda | 847,302 |
49. Angola | 806,552 |
50. Ethiopia | 743,153 |
51. Sweden | 720,200 |
52. Austria | 697,931 |
53. Afghanistan | 615,684 |
54. Finland | 600,300 |
55. Czechia | 583,560 |
56. Guatemala | 564,314 |
57. South Korea | 553,596 |
58. Syria | 540,000 |
59. Myanmar | 512,443 |
60. New Zealand | 511,776 |
61. Israel | 511,163 |
62. Serbia | 487,909 |
63. Saudi Arabia | 482,305 |
64. Greece | 465,770 |
65. Sudan | 442,988 |
66. Portugal | 431,686 |
67. Latvia | 426,900 |
68. Tunisia | 423,800 |
69. Switzerland | 417,156 |
70. Armenia | 415,050 |
71. Bosnia and Herzegovina | 394,274 |
72. Lebanon | 387,791 |
73. Vietnam | 376,377 |
74. Venezuela | 371,744 |
75. Libya | 348,361 |
76. Hungary | 330,545 |
77. Norway | 326,400 |
78. Mali | 310,902 |
79. Cameroon | 302,706 |
80. Burundi | 302,665 |
81. Lithuania | 296,229 |
82. Iraq | 294,778 |
83. Turkmenistan | 293,533 |
84. Mozambique | 273,335 |
85. Ireland | 273,000 |
86. Ecuador | 269,201 |
87. Bulgaria | 261,594 |
88. Madagascar | 257,379 |
89. Albania | 254,543 |
90. Yemen | 248,889 |
91. Georgia | 237,500 |
92. Croatia | 182,261 |
93. North Macedonia | 181,931 |
94. Jordan | 177,431 |
95. Moldova | 174,774 |
96. Slovakia | 169,953 |
97. Mongolia | 168,883 |
98. Niger | 168,569 |
99. Uganda | 162,151 |
100. Guinea | 151,326 |
101. Cuba | 135,147 |
102. Lesotho | 130,602 |
103. Thailand | 125,106 |
104. Philippines | 117,423 |
105. Cyprus | 106,452 |
106. Democratic Republic of the Congo | 101,398 |
107. Costa Rica | 93,567 |
108. Sri Lanka | 88,897 |
109. Dominican Republic | 88,557 |
110. Estonia | 88,434 |
111. Uruguay | 87,000 |
112. Senegal | 79,499 |
113. Slovenia | 72,917 |
114. Nicaragua | 66,167 |
115. Taiwan | 62,287 |
116. Zimbabwe | 60,521 |
117. Palestine | 57,315 |
118. Bhutan | 56,792 |
119. Chad | 41,583 |
120. Kuwait | 36,212 |
121. Haiti | 34,475 |
122. Honduras | 26,904 |
123. Montenegro | 26,098 |
124. Panama | 23,941 |
125. Mauritius | 17,033 |
126. Luxembourg | 16,211 |
127. Jamaica | 16,184 |
128. Oman | 15,613 |
129.. Namibia | 14,520 |
130. Zambia | 13,546 |
Potato area harvested (FAOSTAT, 2018) – hectares
World total: 17,578,672 hectares
1. China | 4,810,888 |
2. India | 2,151,000 |
3. Ukraine | 1,319,900 |
4. Russian Federation | 1,313,495 |
5. Bangladesh | 477,419 |
6. United States of America | 414,115 |
7. Nigeria | 371,341 |
8. Peru | 323,092 |
9. Poland | 297,484 |
10. Belarus | 271,772 |
11. Germany | 252,200 |
12. Kenya | 217,315 |
13. North Korea | 215,390 |
14. France | 199,886 |
15. Nepal | 195,268 |
16. Pakistan | 193,992 |
17. Kazakhstan | 192,326 |
18. Tanzania | 190,053 |
19. Bolivia | 180,802 |
20. Egypt | 176,670 |
21. Romania | 173,296 |
22. Netherlands | 164,689 |
23. Iran | 164,410 |
24. Algeria | 149,665 |
25. Colombia | 141,299 |
26. United Kingdom | 140,000 |
27. Turkey | 135,904 |
28. Canada | 134,102 |
29. Angola | 131,403 |
30. Brazil | 118,297 |
31. Belgium | 93,331 |
32. Rwanda | 92,800 |
33. Uzbekistan | 86,443 |
34. Kyrgyzstan | 84,428 |
35. Japan | 73,281 |
36. Argentina | 72,442 |
37. Indonesia | 68,683 |
38. South Africa | 68,277 |
39. Malawi | 68,133 |
40. Spain | 67,488 |
41. Ethiopia | 66,933 |
42. Morocco | 62,033 |
43. Mexico | 60,303 |
44. Azerbaijan | 59,311 |
45. Denmark | 51,961 |
46. Tajikistan | 49,643 |
47. Italy | 46,429 |
48. Madagascar | 43,435 |
49. Chile | 41,268 |
50. Uganda | 37,754 |
51. Sudan | 35,584 |
52. Bosnia and Herzegovina | 35,159 |
53. Myanmar | 33,468 |
54. Afghanistan | 32,400 |
55. Syria | 30,000 |
56. Australia | 29,740 |
57. Serbia | 28,232 |
58. Burundi | 27,097 |
59. South Korea | 25,772 |
60. Tunisia | 25,082 |
61. Vietnam | 24,673 |
62. Sweden | 23,810 |
63. Austria | 23,755 |
64. Czechia | 22,889 |
65. Guatemala | 22,480 |
66. Latvia | 22,100 |
67. Ecuador | 22,099 |
68. Armenia | 22,062 |
69. Democratic Republic of the Congo | 22,002 |
70. Finland | 21,400 |
71. Portugal | 20,800 |
72. Cameroon | 20,449 |
73. Venezuela | 19,733 |
74. Lithuania | 19,163 |
75. Saudi Arabia | 19,149 |
76. Moldova | 18,946 |
77. Georgia | 18,800 |
78. Iraq | 18,780 |
79. Mozambique | 18,022 |
80. Libya | 17,918 |
81.Greece | 16,830 |
82. Turkmenistan | 16,697 |
83. Yemen | 16,171 |
84. Lebanon | 15,355 |
85. Israel | 15,036 |
86. Bulgaria | 14,096 |
87. Mali | 13,689 |
88. Hungary | 13,387 |
89. Mongolia | 12,925 |
90. North Macedonia | 12,691 |
91. Guinea | 11,753 |
92. Norway | 11,614 |
93. Switzerland | 10,613 |
94. New Zealand | 10,152 |
95. Albania | 9,726 |
96. Croatia | 9,272 |
97. Ireland | 8,200 |
98. Slovakia | 7,760 |
99. Lesotho | 7,640 |
100. Thailand | 7,639 |
101. Philippines | 7,571 |
102. Cuba | 6,162 |
103. Jordan | 5,795 |
104. Niger | 5,672 |
105. Bhutan | 5,369 |
106. Estonia | 5,205 |
107. Sri Lanka | 5,174 |
108. Chad | 4,237 |
109. Cyprus | 4,223 |
110. Uruguay | 4,167 |
111. Swaziland | 4,035 |
112. Costa Rica | 3,682 |
113. Zimbabwe | 3,538 |
114. Nicaragua | 3,430 |
115. Senegal | 3,356 |
116. Dominican Republic | 3,321 |
117. Slovenia | 2,812 |
118. Haiti | 2,718 |
119. Taiwan | 2,654 |
120. Honduras | 1,815 |
121. Zambia | 1,809 |
122. Montenegro | 1,619 |
123. Central African Republic | 1,578 |
124. Palestine | 1,562 |
125. Namibia | 1,201 |
126. Jamaica | 1,122 |
127. Panama | 960 |
128. Timor-Leste | 865 |
129. Burkina Faso | 752 |
130. Mauritius | 719 |
Source: FAOSTAT
Photo: MyGourmetConnection