Finland: Over four million kilos of potatoes destroyed by fire

It is above all the country's production of seed potatoes that has been affected by the fire. Hanna Kortemaa, director of the plant production department at the Swedish Food Agency, tells Yle that up to a fifth of the country's stock of seed potatoes was destroyed.

The damage is so extensive that the Finnish Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry gathered immediately on Friday to discuss the situation, says Hanna Kortemaa to Yle. Among other things, it was discussed how to be able to secure Finland's seed potato production in the coming years.

Most of the Finnish seed potatoes are sold to the domestic market, but a certain share is exported abroad. According to Hanna Kortemaa, both of these markets will be affected by the destruction. However, she does not believe that the fire in the potato warehouse will be noticed at the consumer level.

Important region for potatoes

The warehouses were located in Tyrnävä, Ostrobothnia. There, and in the neighboring municipality of Limingo, approximately 75 percent of all of Finland's seed potatoes are produced, writes Yle.

Tyrnävä and Limingo belong to a so-called high grade area. This means that it is a production area for high-quality seed potatoes.

There are only four such areas in the entire EU. The other three are in Ireland, Germany and the Portuguese Azores archipelago.

A characteristic of potatoes from these high grade areas is that they are high quality and free of plant pests.