Potato Processing Could Be Big Industry

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30146, 1 June 1963, Page 10

Potato Processing Could Be Big Industry

A potato processing industry that could earn an export income for New Zealand of between £6om. and £7om. a year has been suggested by Mr C. M. Driver, a potato breeder at the Crop Research Division of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research at Lincoln.

Mr Driver believes that New Zealand’s . favourable climate would make it possible to produce low cost raw material which would give the processed potato product an advantage over New Zealand’s present primary exports in Eastern countries.

Canterbury is envisaged as the centre of the industry.

In a report on the possibilities of such an industry for New Zealand, Mr Driver

says that the return of food units an acre from plants is considerably greater than from animals, so that provided an acceptable food can be produced the cost a food unit is likely to be lower and the food could be acceptable in markets at present largely closed to animal products. Potatoes could be processed at a reasonable cost to produce an “instant mash’’ material, which readily reconstituted with the addition of water or milk to form mashed potatoes. Under the Canadian Asselberg process adopted by the Waitaki Farmers’ Freezing Company at Pukeuni, near Oamaru, Mr Driver said, potatoes could be combined with a number of other foods to give very acceptable products of desirable nutritive standards Mixtures could be made of mashed potatoes with meat, fish, eggs, cheese and milk an! some vegetables. Should the process develop it could utilise surplus lower grade

meats and surplus dairy products and help to stabilise the fish industry. Eastern Markets

Mr Driver said that the market Tor dehydrated potatoes and potato mixtures in New Zealand would be very limited. There might be some markets in Europe but the greatest scope was in Eastern markets.

For the scheme to have any chance of success production would have to be efficient. Sufficient knowledge was available to indicate that potato crops of not less than 20 tons an acre could be produced regularly in New Zealand and this was used as a basis for suggesting the establishment of an industry. The lowest world price at the factory at present- was about 2s per lb for potato flakes. As a conversion rate of seven units of the fresh product to one of the processed product and allowing for losses of 15 to 30 per cent, in the preparation of the fresh potatoes, the equivalent price for the raw material would be 2.4 d to

2.9 d per lb. At 2s per lb the production from one acre of processed potatoes would be worth between £6OO and £7OO. This was considerably greater than the product value an acre from dairying or meat production. The costs were admittedly higher tor potatoes but these were largely kept within the country and helped to provide employment. “On this basis, 100.000 acres of potatoes could produce material with an export value of £6om to £7om annually,” said Mr Driver. “In contrast the dairy industry in 1960-61 gave us products for export worth some £62m (not including local consumption), and this was from some 6m to 7m acres of our best land."

Mr Driver said that production from 100,000 acres would provide the equivalent of a serving a day for 37m people, or one serving a week for 250 m. To sell this would require higih-pressure salesmanship, but New Zealand could well be the. first in the field in producing at a low price balanced rations to supplement available foods in any area.

As one factory could eope with the produce from 3000 to 5000 acres. Mr Driver said that 20 to 30 factories would be needed. Under irrigation, he said. H was suggested that 100,000 acres could be used for growing potatoes without reducing animal products.r. If potato growing did expand into a large-scale industry, Mr Driver said, it might be possible to use waste products or cull potatoes for starch production. Uses of potato starch included papeproduction, cloth sizing in some foods, and it could b< the basis of a chemical industry. It was claimed flhat a successful industry had t been established in Sweden on the production of amino-acids from potatoes.