Prince Edward Island By Alex Docherty – Chairman, Prince Edward Island Potato Board Challenges and opportunities are ahead for efforts to market the 2015 crop at a level growers need for a good return on investment. In Prince Edward Island, our production was actually down 1.5 per cent from 2014 due to variable yields across the province; however, good yields and increases in volume in the east, particularly Quebec, New Brunswick and Maine, will add to…
New Brunswick By Louis Ouellette – Market Information Co-ordinator, Potatoes New Brunswick The 2015 New Brunswick potato crop got off to a slightly late and slow start with June being cool and a little damp. The first half of July was dry with warm temperatures. Starting around mid-July, timely and adequate rainfall hit most areas of the New Brunswick potato belt. The majority of growers are expecting a minimum of an average to an…
New Brunswick By Louis Ouellette, Market Information Co-ordinator, Potatoes New Brunswick The 2014 crop held up very well throughout the entire storage season and quality was excellent with next to no storage issues. As of mid-June, inventories were still higher than normal on processing and fresh potatoes for this time of the year, but with a hopefully busy end to the season we could see these extra potatoes find a proper home. Seed quality…
Prince Edward Island By Alex Docherty, Chairman, Prince Edward Island Potato Board As of the beginning of March, we were in the middle of the 2014/2015 shipping season. Quality remained top-notch, processing use was up over last year, and demand for fresh use seemed to be picking up. Post-harvest testing for the potato virus Y and potato leaf roll viruses in seed had been completed for the most part, with an approximately 90…
New Brunswick By Louis Ouellette, Market Information Co-ordinator, Potatoes New Brunswick The 2014 fall harvest in New Brunswick took place under almost perfect weather conditions, with late September and early October offering ideal conditions for digging. The main harvest started the week of Sept. 22, and there was frost on some fields that week that resulted in reduced yields on affected farms as well as some plants shutting down a little earlier…
New Brunswick By Louis Ouellette, Market Information Co-ordinator Potatoes New Brunswick It was a very pleasant summer here in New Brunswick. A late spring got the crop into the ground about two weeks behind normal planting time, but almost ideal temperatures helped this year’s crop make up some much-needed time over the growing season. As of mid-September, the northern part of New Brunswick’s potato belt had received adequate rain and many growers…
New Brunswick By Louis Ouellette, Market Information Co-ordinator Potatoes New Brunswick The 2014 New Brunswick potato planting season got off to a slower start than normal. A long, cold winter led to soil temperatures not warming up until the second half of May. Once growers got on the fields, favourable planting weather saw the majority of crop get into the ground by June 11 or so. Regardless of the late start, if…
Quebec By Clement LaLancette, General Manager Federation des Producteurs de Pommes de Terre du Quebec In 2010, 2011 and 2012, Quebec potato producers participated in a project to determine the efficacy of using the Miléos forecasting model to control potato late blight disease (Phytophthora infestans), compared to preventative systematic fungicide treatments. The project was financed by the Canadian Agricultural Adaptation Program. The Miléos model was developed by Arvalis, a French vegetal institute,…
Canadian Potato Council By Joe Brennan, Chair Canadian Potato Council Canadian Agri-Science Cluster for Horticulture 2 The Canadian potato industry has received a commitment from Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada of more than $4.7 million in funding under the Growing Forward 2 program. This funding is part of the government’s ongoing agri-science cluster project and will be combined with grower and industry contributions of approximately $2.2 million to fund potato research over the…
Alberta By Terence Hochstein, Executive Director Potato Growers of Alberta Following a growing season during which growers experienced many firsts in terms of weather conditions, Alberta potato producers harvested their 2013 crop with a mixed bag of results. Hail, wind, extreme heat and humidity, along with some late blight pressure, led to varying yields from grower to grower. While there have been some reports of harvest yields of up to 440 hundredweight…