Egyptian potatoes heading to Moroccan markets

Egypt is preparing to export shipments of potatoes to the Kingdom of Morocco, as the Minister of Agriculture and Land Reclamation in the Cairo government announced yesterday, Thursday, the opening of Moroccan markets to Egyptian potatoes and Canadian markets to Egyptian strawberries, as part of the ministry’s efforts to find new international markets for his country’s agricultural products. .

The audio and visual information center of the aforementioned ministry explained, in a statement, that this step came based on “the report received by the minister, guardian of the sector, from the Egyptian Agricultural Reservation Administration, which indicates the success of this administration in opening the Moroccan market to Egyptian potatoes,” noting that The National Office for Sanitary Safety of Food Products (UNSA) informed the Egyptian side of its official approval to open the Moroccan market to Egypt’s agricultural exports of potatoes and to actually begin exporting.

The same source indicated that all necessary measures are being taken to open other international markets to Egyptian agricultural products, which have now invaded most of the world’s markets and the demand for them is increasing from all countries, due to their high quality and following all phytosanitary procedures and conditions for importing countries, while the Minister of Agriculture and Land Reclamation was It was reported that the value of Egypt’s agricultural exports amounted to about $1.5 billion during the first quarter of this year, at a time when agricultural exports are among the largest sources of Egyptian national income.

The electronic newspaper Hespress learned from an informed source that the quantities that will be imported from Egypt “are not intended for internal consumption,” and that “the matter relates to a specific type of potato used in the manufacture of potato chips or chips, as well as fried potato chips used by restaurants.”

The Hespress source explained that “some industrial units in Casablanca were the ones that requested these quantities from Egypt, due first to their low price, and also to the lack of production of this type of potato at the local level,” stressing that “there is a large surplus of potatoes in Moroccan markets at a very low price.” In fact, the producers are demanding that the ban on exporting this product to African markets be lifted.”

Reacting to the issue, Riad Ohtita, an agricultural expert, said that “Morocco opened its national market to Egyptian potatoes of this type, and this is explained by the high prices of semi-frozen potatoes destined for frying, which are widely consumed and in high demand by restaurants,” noting that “ The price of one kilogram of this type of potato has recently increased by nearly double, currently reaching 15 dirhams.”

Ohtita added, in a statement to Hespress, that “the scarcity of knowledge of this product on the national market level prompted Morocco to open the way for importing it from Egypt, given that importing from this country would be cheaper than producing it locally,” noting that “the Kingdom has begun to deal with a similar strategy.” “With the Spanish strategy in managing the issue of import and export and opening new markets for the products of other countries.”

In the same context, the speaker pointed out that “Egypt is an agricultural country that enjoys climatic and soil conditions suitable for a range of crops. Therefore, it is natural for Morocco to resort to it to import some products within the framework of achieving harmony and balance in self-sufficiency and export abroad, as potatoes are exported to a number of European countries in exchange for searching for external markets to supply products that are not produced at the local level.”

Ohtaita concluded that “the Kingdom of Morocco benefits economically from this process, as it pays for imported quantities in US dollars, while it pays for its exports in euros, and the latter has a relatively high value against the dollar,” noting that “openness to Egyptian or other markets From the markets, it also finds an explanation in the continuing droughts, water scarcity, and weak production capacity for a number of agricultural products.”