The Potato Council (PCL), a division of the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB), recorded 100 international enquiries about seed potatoes at their exhibit at this year’s record breaking
Fruit Logistica exhibition (February 3rd to 5th 2010). Additionally, many of the visitors signed up to receive further information via Potato Council’s international World Service export newsletter, resulting in a circulation increase of 20%.
Potato varieties have been specially developed for overseas growers, taking account of particular growing conditions and consumer tastes – British seed is now successfully grown in markets as distant as Asia and South America, home of the potato. At Fruit Logistica the PCL stand received trade visitors from as far afield as Russia, Chile and Israel.
According to Mark Prentice, PCL head of seed and export: “Foreign potato growers were most impressed with the information in the multi-language brochures we had taken with us. They flew off the stand – leaving the shelves virtually empty by the end of the last day. British exporters were able to use the stand as a base for meeting new and existing contacts and their reaction has been extremely encouraging.”
Marcel de Sousa, Managing Director of exporter IPM, says: “We used the PCL area to meet with numerous existing clients; it seemed that anyone who already buys GB seed automatically came to the stand. We also created the opportunity to talk to other exporters which provided valuable knowledge for our seed export effort.”
