The UK’s largest field trial potato event was held last Thursday at James Hutton Institute’s Balruddery Farm. The event was attended by farmers, commercial breeders, processors, agronomists and researchers.

The day showcased real trials in the field which highlighted different varieties, growing techniques, plant protection products and machinery. The day was organised by the James Hutton institute, AHDB, SRUC and Agrii.

Craig, John and Kevin Zimmerman, mixed arable farmers in Angus

John said: “It’s good to come here and see the research and new varieties. Looks like there could be a lot of scabby Maris Piper this year and an overall shortage.

“We look to be 3-4t down this year with harvest maybe two weeks early.

“But seeing the trials it looks like there could be some places with quality too. Prices look to be high but not many buyers are committing to a price.”

David Swales, AHDB

“We have good news on Brexit for potatoes compared to other sectors. They are less exposed to changes in trade.

“However, the specialist seed sector needs to get deals done to ensure markets like Egypt continue.”

Rob Burns head of seed and export at AHDB told attendees at the show about their work to increase export opportunities for potatoes. Recently the levy body travelled to Kenya to develop the seed potato market where seed trials are now underway.

Visits to Rwanda, which currently averages a yield of around 10t/ha, demonstrated they are looking for a European seed potato. Tanzania was highlighted as an opportunity too.

East Africa has been shown to be a big potential for UK potatoes as the market for chips and crisps grows. Other new opportunities like Cuba are being worked on so that exporters can navigate doing business in recently opened markets.

With 6% of UK seed potato exports already going to the Canary islands there is a feeling the same varieties would work in the Caribbean.

Edward Gilbert, Standen

“This is a great event for us as it’s so focused on potatoes. We have been selling a lot more toppers recently. Farmers are looking at the reduced amount of chemical controls available and the way it’s heading and seeking conventional methods.

“This, Holland-made, six-row model costs around £30,000 and needs a 150hp tractor.”

Andrew Lorimer, director of Whole Crop Marketing

“I am concerned about the loss of chemicals in farming and how we can cope. We’re working with experts who are using microbial and biostimulant products instead of standard fungicides. You can see the success in the plants with the new products used in the row to the left. We are growing about 150,000t of potatoes with 20,000t of seed going into the UK and European market.”

Rachel Fields, agricultural data scientist

“I am here with Sirius promoting our polyhalite fertiliser which we turn to a granule for broadcast mainly before planting. Our trials here were a success. Products like ours could be in serious demand as they reduce the use of chloride inputs. We are building a mine in Yorkshire to extract the polyhalite hoping to be operational in 2021.”

Emily Page, agronomist and AHDB NextGen graduate

Page explained the importance of the environmental impact of potato growing. She said there was an impression that potato growing was bad for the environment with frequent spraying and high water usage cited as reasons.

Maris Piper future

Abby Easton, another NewGen graduate asked the seminar if Maris Piper will be a popular in years to come.

“Taste is really important for the potato. A recent study showed that 87% of people said taste was the number-one reason in picking a potato. But it’s hard to breed in taste.”

Looking at the taste of potatoes results showed that Record potato variety performed poorly, Maris Piper a little better with Mayan Gold proving popular.

Carb wars

John Robinson, SRUC, asked the panel about competition from other carbohydrates likes pasta and rice and questioned how the potato can compete.

The panel admitted that the potato can be seen as less consistent and convenient as others. Solutions discussed were putting more variety names on consumer packaging, breed better tasting potatoes, and improving packaging.

Bill Crooks, SRUC soil and water consultant

Crooks offered some advice to farmers on drainage. “We are here today telling farmers to dig into their soil to get to know the issues on their farm. They have been sub-soiling the fields here but it hasn’t worked because it’s new drains which are needed. This field gets wet in the winter and unless drains are working, sub-soiling will not beeffective. The point of sub-soiling is to get the water to the drains but the drains need to be working in the first place.

“This is something we see across the country with farmers sub-soiling when drainage is more needed, but when you look at the costs you can see why draining isn’t popular. We need to be looking at replacing drains every 30-40 years. If putting in new drains, do not forget to add in jet points and mark where the drains are on a map. Even a line on an IACS map then put it to the back of the drawer so you don’t lose it.

“If you have working drains then sub-soiling is a good way to allow water to drain through the soil. Remember to subsoil in the opposite direction of the drains or at an angle. This will help a bigger area to get to the drain quicker. We should all be walking our drain outlets once a year and giving them a clear out if needed.”

Mark Whitehead, a University of Liverpool PhD student based at the James Hutton Institute

“Here we can see a parasitoid wasp laying an egg into a young potato aphid. With a drive to reduce chemical inputs, many farmers will need to turn to other methods to control pests. For aphid control, particularly the potato aphid (Macrosiphum euphorbiae), there is potential to make more of wasps who attack them. Parasitoid wasps lay their eggs inside aphids, killing them. However, we have discovered that one genetic strain of potato aphids are immune and we want to know why. It’s important to know why because over-use of parasitoid wasps could unintentionally select the resistant aphid.

“In the future we could see the potential of generating wasps that can overcome aphid resistance, alongside field management such as planting flowers which attract the wasp next to crops to kill aphids in the surrounding area.”

Tim Pike, Don McLeod, Kyle Gray and Roger Blyth

Tim, Don, Kyle and Roger were over on a 13-day study tour from New Zealand. Tim said: “We are here to learn more about the UK potato sector. I am originally from the UK but not been back for 13 years and there are big changes in storage.

“We don’t have facilities anything like what has sprung up here in recent years. Our seed potatoes are kept in Dutch barns.”

“Our industry is mainly based in the south Island and geared for the domestic market and providing chips and crisps for Australia,” said Kyle.

“Our drive now is to get the plant health up. We are only a relatively small bit of the New Zealand farming industry so we have to fight to get research and development.”

Dominic Duckett, social researcher at the Hutton Institute

Duckett was asking attendees their thoughts on the future of the potato sector along with the impact of Brexit. “We are getting a wide range of responses from people on what they think will happen in the future. It wasn’t all negative, some thought issues like labour shortage could see a bigger drive to mechanisation. Some people felt Brexit offered an opportunity to break away from the recent ruling on banning some genetic techniques at the European Court of Justice. Further imports and tariffs were seen as potentially having good and bad effects on the sector.”