Over the past 12 months, prices per potato kilo have risen by50% on average in the wake of falling supplies amid shrinkingimports, bad weather conditions lower number of growers.
Valeriu Tab`r`, Agriculture and Rural Development Minister, statedthe advance is due to some "technical problems".
In the first 11 months of last year, Romania imported 53,000 tonnesof potatoes, worth 9.5m euros. Exports in the same period reached19,000 tonnes, worth 1.8m euros, according to the NationalStatistics Institute (INS).
Ioan Benea, chairman of the Federation of Romanian Potato Growers(FCCR), estimates Romania's 2010 potato production covers just onethird of quantities needed domestically.
Benea specifies Romania does not have industrial potato producersand that the number of large plantations is low.
Prices will rise further by mid-2011, with significant price dropsas highly unlikely due to the downbeat outlooks for this year'sproduction, believes Benea.
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