CHARLOTTETOWN, P.E.I. – Greg Donald is upbeat discussing the upcoming harvest, until talk turns to potato tampering.
Donald, the general manager of the P.E.I. Potato Board, would rather the topic get buried like, well, a needle in a haystack.
He is concerned further media coverage might plant nefarious ideas in a possible copycat looking to sabotage the spud industry.
The damage was considerable with the report of a dozen incidents of sewing needles inserted into potatoes throughout Atlantic Canada since October 2014.
Donald notes the cost of the tampering crisis hovers around $10 million, an expense that includes detection equipment purchased, modifications to buildings and packing lines, and 100,000 pounds of destroyed potatoes.
Still, Donald says the long-term impact of the tampering will actually have a positive outcome for the Island potato industry.
Prince Edward Island has raised the bar on food safety to a level that is, Donald boasts, second to none.
“The lingering impact is we are probably able to give the greatest assurance to suppliers of the quality of the potatoes,’’ he says.
Still, the industry is on guard.
In a statement last week, the P.E.I. Potato Board urged Islanders to report suspicious behavior, including unauthorized persons accessing a farmer’s field, to the farmer or to the local RCMP detachment.
“The vigilance of our friends and neighbours is invaluable to the industry this fall as farmers work hard at getting the 2016 crop safely stored for the new marketing season,’’ the board says.
This year the biggest foe to the potato industry in P.E.I. was dry weather, particularly below average precipitation in June and July.
However, an increase in rainfall in August has made for a more promising potato harvest just now getting underway for storage.
Donald anticipates about an average yield this year with close to 2.5 billion pounds of potatoes being harvested.
He adds prices look better so far this year.
P.E.I.’s largest market for potatoes is Canada, but the province also exports plenty of spuds to the US and Puerto Rico.
Sixty per cent of the potatoes are being harvested for processing, 30 per cent for table stock and 10 per cent for seed.
Originally posted at The Telegram
