Friday 23 April 2021
Belgium’s potato industry is suffering
French fries production suffers from Corona
The Belgian chips industry sent out calls for help last year. Because of the corona pandemic, many farmers were left sitting on their potatoes. Even now exports continue to decline.
The potato industry in Belgium, which is in love with fries, suffered significant losses in the Corona year 2020. Instead of the planned 5.6 million tons of potatoes, only 5.08 million tons were processed that year, said Romain Cools from the Association of the Potato Processing Industry (Belgapom). In 2019 it was 5.4 million tons.
According to Belgapom, investments in the sector fell by 15 percent compared to the previous year. 16.5 percent fewer people worked in the industry than in 2019. The exports of Belgian companies have decreased by around ten percent, said Cools. According to the industry, Belgium is the world’s largest exporter of frozen potato products such as French fries.
A call by Romain Cools in April 2020 to the Belgians caused a sensation to eat fries twice a week instead of once. Because there was no export, farmers stayed on their potatoes and the cold rooms were full to the brim. A year later, Cools is certain: “The appeal and media interest had a positive effect on sales.” The famous Belgian chip stalls, on the other hand, were less caught off guard by the crisis than the processing industry and exporters.
He has a hard time calling them a victim, said Bernard Lefèvre, chairman of the national umbrella association of chip shop operators Navefri. Because in the “big family” of gastronomy, the chips stalls would have had the opportunity to sell something at least all the time. Nevertheless, there were sales losses of 20 to 80 percent, and tourist-dependent stalls in the big cities were more severely affected.
.