According to the daily monitoring data of EastFruit project, this week the potato market in Ukraine has seen a decrease in trading activity. Contrary to the hopes of farmers that this product will once again increase in price on the eve of New Year vacations, the selling prices for potatoes in Ukraine, on the contrary, began to decline. Wholesale companies, in turn, see no reason to raise prices and increase the volume of purchases of this product, as the demand for this product has significantly decreased.
Thus, today marketable potatoes are on sale in the range of 18-28 UAH/kg ($0.43-0.67/kg), depending on the quality, variety and volume of offered batches of products, which is on average 12% cheaper than at the end of the last working week.
The reason for a slight decrease in prices in this segment was not only weakening demand for potatoes, but also stable supplies of these products from foreign markets. At the same time, most key market players note mediocre quality characteristics of imported potatoes, which, in turn, affected the pace of sales of local products as well.
Nevertheless, in general, Ukrainian farmers do not complain about the selling prices for potatoes this season, because this product has risen in price by an average of 41% compared to last year. The reason for such a significant price difference experts call the decline in potato yields in Ukraine due to unfavorable weather conditions in the summer months. Many farmers also note a gradual deterioration in the quality of products stored in storage.
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