India looks to sell to Middle East

Indian exporters have begun marketing potatoes, the county's second largest vegetable crop in terms of volume, in the Middle East and in South East Asia.

This is as a result of the second consecutive bumper crop of 37 million tonnes this year, reported indiatimes.com.

Currently around 2 million tonnes are exported to Singapore, Pakistan and Dubai.

Farmers have been seeing reduced incomes from potatoes as the large volumes have driven down prices to below the cost of production, forcing them to seek alternative markets.

"We are planning to sell potato seeds to Egypt and other the Middle East countries. A clear idea of the potato crop will be there by a fortnight," said Jalandhar-based Confederation of Potato Seed Farmers chief Sukhjit Bhatt.