Germany
kartoffel
Year2007
Production
12 835 000 tons
Harvested area
679 440 acres
Yield
18.8 tons/acre
Taken to Germany at the end of the 1500s, the potato was grown almost exclusively as animal feed for the next 200 years. But, after a severe famine in the 1770s, German monarchs - notably Frederick the Great of Prussia - promoted the kartoffel as a staple food crop as well.
Today Germany is the world's seventh largest potato producer, and the biggest in western Europe, with output in 2007 of just over 12.7 million tons. Even so, German potato production has been falling since 1960 - then, the harvest was more than 36 million tons and potato growing occupied 10 percent of all arable land, compared to less than three percent today.
Germany is a major potato processor and exporter. In 2005 it processed more than seven million tons of potatoes, including 3.6 million tons transformed into potato starch, and exported 1.4 million tons of fresh potatoes and 2.2 million tons (primary equivalent) of processed products. It is also a leading importer of early potatoes (nearly 600 000 tons, mostly from France, Italy and Egypt, in 2005).