HUGE POTATO FARM

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20603, 3 November 1941, Page 9

HUGE POTATO FARM

CRISPS FOR FORCES MILLIONS OF PACKETS Two English villages, whose names are recorded in William the Conqueror’s Domesday Book, to-day supply Britain’s fighting forces with millions of packets of potato crisps. They come from 20,000 tons of potatoes, grown on the world’s .largest potato farm and producing about 125,000,000 packets of “crisps” a year. It is the biggest purely agricultural estate in England, covering an area seven miles and a half long by four miles and a half wide of the best Lincolnshire heath and fenland. It is served by a light railway, with 30 miles of track, 120' trucks and five Diesel engines, and it takes in the whole of the village of Nocton and most of Dunston.

All the potatoes from the estate, and the output of 80 other farms, are turned unto “crisps” in 10 factories distributed throughout Great Britain. There are two other factories in Australia, one at Sydney pnd the other at Melbourne. The English and Scottish factories use 40,000 tons of potatoes a year to produce 5,000,000 packets of “crisps” a week." They supply Britdin’s civil population as well as service canteens and troopships.

A special variety of potato, the Muizen, was imported from the Netherlands, and this strain, now quite acclimatised to Britain, still gives the best results.