“Maintaining agreements with growers guarantees quality"

Roberto Ruiz

Udapa is in the middle of setting up their new facilities and is carrying out various trials and tests. This stage will intensify in October and the facilities will be fully operational in time for the area’s production start.

At the moment, the company sells around 35,000 million kilos every year which represents 14,000 million Euros of turnover, but with their Strategic Plan 2006-2010, they will be able to reach 50,000 million kilos and around 22,000 million in sales. Roberto Ruiz, Udapa’s Director, affirms that a whole series of strategic activities have been launched which “are bringing results and confirm to us that we are heading in the right direction”. Amongst these, there is the contractual commitment with growers whereby a technical follow-up is foreseen by engineers of the cooperative itself. “We are setting up field tests for all phases of crop development and in all growing areas, from France to Castile–León or Seville”. Spanish crops are in line with the requirements of Integrated Production and the French ones use Global Gap.

The Strategic Plan also lays out other priorities such as improved positioning with regard to retail, internal organisation, reduction in cost structure, etc… Ninety-nine percent of all potato the cooperative receives is washed and packed in the usual formats that reach both traditional shops as well as large-scale retail. Udapa’s main markets are in the areas closest to them, mainly in the Basque Country, in Mercabilbao, Mercairuña, Mercabugati as well as in the markets of Santander and Logroño. It has a very smooth and strong relationship with Eroski because both companies are cooperatives.

The cooperative works all year round with produce from different sources, but mainly with Spanish potato from throughout the country. Even in winter, it alternates French potato with Spanish that has been kept in the cooperatives cold stores. “Having our production close at hand means that we can start buying French produce in January. In other areas they have to start already in September.”

They can manage to fill their 10,000 million kilo capacity cold stores twice which means they are exceeding 18,000 million kilos.

Roberto Ruiz confirms he is very “critical” when it comes to the issue of variety. “I do not believe that a particular variety in itself can guarantee suitability for cooking because there are many other factors involved too, who has grown the crop, how much fertiliser has been used, watering, temperature control, handling during storage, etc.”

In this sense he points out how, for example, the Agria potato which is well suited to frying, can turn black and sweet if it is stored under four degrees because its starch then turns to sugar.

“The varieties are the private property of their creators and a variety, as soon as it becomes intellectual property, becomes a sales item. The creators have a vested interest in assuring that a variety can guarantee a specific cooking purpose”.