After a four-year decline in potato production nationwide, this season’s crop appears poised to buck the trend, spurred by strong demand and improved water supplies. While higher processing contract prices are driving much of the increased acreage, California’s mostly fresh-market growers may see prices decline once harvest starts elsewhere, said Almuhanad Melhim, a fruit and vegetable market analyst for Rabobank’s RaboResearch division. … During the past few years, processors have been short on russet potatoes that go into french fries, so they snapped up fresh-market russet supplies, driving up fresh prices. To encourage more processed potato production this year, processors increased contract prices substantially.

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