Last Friday, European potato traders and producers gathered in Hotel Amigo in Brussels for the annual Europatat Congress. 90 visitors from 21 different countries learned more about the subject ‘Potatoes: a healthy, sustainable and responsible sector.’ The day was opened by brand new Europatat president Gilles Fontaine (Desmazières France), who was nominated president during the Europatat General Assembly on Thursday.
Gilles Fontaine opens the day
After an introduction by Europatat Secretary General Raquel Izquierdo de Santiago, Christophe Ginisty took the floor. The French digital strategist & reputation management specialist spoke about how the potato industry can use social media in order to reach consumers in an effective way. Firstly, he encouraged his audience to educate their consumers via social media. “Surely people love knowledge”. He also told visitors to partner with their consumers by being inspirational, engaged, transparent, easy to follow and emotional. “Emotions are hot,” Christophe added, “and therefore people share emotions”. Lastly Christophe told his listeners to use social media as a way to find out what people think about your products.
During the second session of the day, several speakers were invited to educate attendees about the subject “Health and sustainability in the potato sector go hand in hand.” This was moderated by Romain Cools, Secretary General of Belgapom. Speakers were Tania Santivanez (FAO Regional Office for Europe and Central Asia), Toine Timmermans (Wageningen UR Food & Biobased research) and Loes Neven (VIGeZ).
Tania spoke about how potatoes can reduce food shortages in developing countries and about challenges and opportunities in the production system. “Above all, we have to care about soil, because this is our most important resource,” Romain added. Toine told more about how to prevent food losses. “The solutions are there, but can we take responsibility?” According to Toine, the most important thing is to connect. “Tell your neighbours and cooperate against food waste.” As an example Toine showed a bottle of ‘Pieperbier’, Dutch potato beer which was developed to valorise potato remnants.
Toine Timmermans. On the table on the right: Pieperbier
Loes Neven continued the session by telling us more about how potatoes contribute to a healthy lifestyle. “Potatoes have been given a bad reputation by several health gurus, but the potato itself is not the problem. The problem is the way it’s cooked. Obviously, it’s better to eat cooked potatoes than French fries.”
After a networking lunch break, the afternoon’s Key note speaker Tine Delva spoke about how companies can help to reach the Sustainable Development Goals. Tine is the Policy Adviser at the Secretariat-General of the European Commission in charge of the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the associated targets. She told listeners that they can contribute to the goals by strengthening engagements of customers, employees and other stakeholders.
Three case studies by Jolanda Soons-Dings (LambWeston Meijer), Gilles Fontaine and Arnaud Delacour (UNPT) followed. Jolanda introduced the striking quote "more crop per drop" and showed how LambWeston Meijer works to reach their sustainability goals. Cooperation is key, and therefore she ended with the African proverb: "If you want to go fast, travel alone. If you want to go far, travel with others." Gilles spoke about the importance of happy employees. He inspired others by telling about the "I love my company-event" his employees organised and also underlined that, compared to other industries, people who work in the potato industry tend to stay in the industry for a long time. Arnaud, who is a potato producers and president of the national union of French potato producers, spoke about ways in which potatoes can be produced in a sustainable way and drew attention to the residue-free logo in France.
The day was concluded by Michael Scannell, director for the food chain - Stakeholder and International Relations in the Directorate General for Health and Food Safety, European Commission.
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