Research from Belgium

June has marked the end of Europatat’s Presidency for Mr Gilles Fontaine, who joined Europatat’s Board in 2014 as Treasurer and became President in 2018.

How do different potatoes respond to heat, drought, and waterlogging stresses? EU-backed scientists are investigating the changes that make potatoes resilient or susceptible.

A lot of water, energy and nutrition is lost during the processing of vegetables and potatoes. Scientists from Ghent University, together with partners Flanders' FOOD, Howest, VITO and Vlakwa, are therefore reviewing the processing process from A to Z in the VEG-i-TEC research center.

Europatat is part of an international consortium involved in the research project ADAPT (“Accelerated Development of multiple-stress tolerAnt PoTato”), which aims at developing new strategies to make potatoes fit for the challenging growth conditions of the future.

Mathijs Peters, responsible for EU Corporate Affairs at PepsiCo was elected President of the European Snacks Association asbl (ESA) for a two-year term. He succeeds Dr. Rolf Nilges, Intersnack’s Director of Research & Development and External Affairs.

RUCIP European Committee -  the organisation that looks after the rules and practices of the Inter-European Trade in Potatoes - has a new internal organisation and new leadership.

An overview of the Belgian agricultural landscape. The cropmap shows the main crop type on each individual field cultivated in the 2020 growing season and is openly available via an interactive online viewer.

TOMRA Food is reaching out to vegetable processors everywhere to help them tackle the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Starch Europe today welcomed the much-anticipated publication of the European Commission’s EU Farm to Fork Strategy. Starch Europe and its members strongly support the Commission’s climate neutrality ambition and the important role a more sustainable food system plays to achieve that objective.

Europatat welcomes the Farm to Fork Strategy published today by the European Commission. There is a need to secure a fair, healthy, and environmentally-friendly food system, a message that the potato sector fully endorses.