Market Update

California Sweet Potatoes

Market Snapshot

The U.S. Department of Agriculture was reporting the following prices on 40-pound cartons of U.S. No. 1 Grade sweet potatoes from California:

Orange: Mostly $17. Red: Mostly $17. White: Mostly $23. Japanese: $23-25

* Prices from the USDA's Fruit & Vegetable Market News, Feb.16.

The Shipping Scene

Availability of California sweet potatoes should extend a little later into the season this year, according to the California Sweet Potato Commission. Growers ran out of the tubers early last summer, said Duane Hutton, commission treasurer and manager at Yagi Bros. Produce Inc. in Livingston. This year, supplies should be available until mid- to late summer. The new crop typically comes on by August.

Supplies of most of the major varieties from Classic Yam Inc. in Livingston should be plentiful till the new crop comes on, said saleswoman Dodie Gauger. An exception may be the o'henry variety, which may sell out by late May or early June.

Growing conditions held very well last year, she said, and Classic Yam was able to harvest most of its crop before the rains came. The small amount that was not dug before wet weather arrived was moved out early in the season, so the remaining sweet potatoes are storing well and should have good shelf life.

Gauger hopes to see numerous promotions for Easter, April 4, the last major sweet potato occasion of the season.

So far, movement and prices this year have been good, she said.

"With the economy the way it is, we didn't know what to expect," she said. "The market for us has been good. We haven't seen any real drops."

She attributes steady year-round sales to the increased media attention sweet potatoes have received in recent years along with the public's desire to eat more healthfully.

"Everybody's more health conscious, and they want a great value," she said. "You can't get a better value than sweet potatoes."

Classic Yam should have about the same volume as last year and offers sweet potatoes in 40-pound cartons, 40-pound reusable plastic containers and 10-pound cartons, she said.

Yagi Bros. was close to finishing up its sales of Asian varieties this week - especially No. 1 Grade and medium sizes, Hutton said. The company still had some jumbos available.

The firm also was running short on the red diane variety but had adequate supplies of beauregards and o'henries.

Quality in general has been very good at Yagi Bros., Hutton said. The keeping quality has been especially good. Sizing also is better than last year's, when potatoes were affected by rain.

Hutton characterized this season's prices as "fair" but below last year's and lower than what growers would like to see considering rising costs.

Although the beauregard variety has long been popular in California, growers now seem to be planting more of the covington, another copper-skin sweet potato with orange flesh, he said. The covington seems to produce a higher count of No. 1 grade potatoes per acre.

The state also produces a lot of the red diane - a red-skin, orange-flesh variety - as well as the o'henry or golden sweet white-flesh, white-skin variety.

Unlike most other states that grow sweet potatoes, California has substantial acreage of Asian varieties, which typically have a red-purple skin with white-yellow flesh, he said, and the state also produces organic sweet potatoes.

At AV Thomas Produce in Livingston, quality on the four major varieties is looking good, said vice president Carlos Vieira.

Supplies of the beauregard may be "on the long side," he said, resulting in lower prices than on some of the other varieties. "Great growing conditions" last year led to good yields and strong supplies of beauregards.

"Movement all year has been great," Vieira said. "Demand for fresh sweet potatoes in stores has increased."

Demand also is up from processors, who are using more sweet potatoes for french fries, he said. But supplies of the jumbo sizes that processors prefer may be tighter than usual this year because of the abundance of No. 1 sizes.

USDA estimated the 2009 California sweet potato crop at 5,220 hundredweight, up from 4,366 hundredweight in 2008. Harvested acreage for 2009 is estimated at 17,400 acres, up from 14,800 acres in 2008.

(By Tom Burfield, Western correspondent for The Packer. The Packer and Red Book Credit Services are part of food360º, a division of Vance Publishing Corp., Lincolnshire, Ill.)

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