Europatat, the European Potato Trade Association, has welcomed the new Farm to Fork strategy, details of which were announced last week.

The group has said that the potato sector fully endorses the need to secure a fair, healthy and environmentally-friendly food system.

The Farm to Fork strategy sets out regulatory and non-regulatory measures to make the EU food system a global standard for sustainability.

In doing so, the group has called on the Commission to take a pragmatic and realistic approach, ensuring that the new initiatives and targets are coherent with the current EU legislation and the alternatives already available in the market.

These initiatives should also be pre-assessed and based on scientific evidence.

Disruption

The group cites the anticipated level of disruption that the Farm to Fork regulatory framework can trigger on European food business commercial activities.

Thus, it calls on the European Commission to invest in finding pragmatic and effective solutions to the challenges that the agri-food sector will inevitably encounter in the coming years.

In this sense, Europatat says it is pleased to see that the Commission aims to stimulate research and innovation to provide solutions for sustainable food systems and uncover new market opportunities.

Europatat

Europatat comprises of both national associations and individual companies involved in the trade of seed, ware and early potatoes throughout Europe.

Its members include a wide range of traders (including breeders, distributors, storers, packers, importers and exporters) delivering seed potatoes to farmers, as well as raw material to the food industry, packed potatoes to the retailers and food service sector.