Collaboration Across the Pond

Collaboration Across the Pond

Collaboration Across the Pond

I’m KayDee Gilkey with the U.S. Potato Update.

For the past 12 years, the United States Potato Board and their UK counterpart, the British Potato Council, have been working together.

USPB President and CEO Tim O’Connor says the two organizations began sharing nutrition and market research as both have similar market places and relatively homogenous consumers.

O’Connor: “We saw the opportunity right away to collaborate because the British Potato Council’s marketing efforts were very similar to ours in the scope of their organization as well as ours. But the fact that we were working in similar countries but not competing countries.vTheir export markets were primarily markets for their seed sales as a opposed to markets for their potatoes or potato products. And so it really left us with a good opportunity to begin working together to exchange information and program ideas because we weren’t competitors, we were able to compliment each other.”

This relationship has also benefited the members of the two countries’ potato organizations, as O’Connor explains.

O’Connor: “This collaboration has been highly beneficial to both of our industries. We both gained knowledge and information from each other that saved investment dollars by both of our respective countries. So it has been good, a very win-win relationship for the growers and industry in each country.”

This was the U.S. Potato Update brought to you by the United States Potato Board, maximizing return on grower investment. I’m KayDee Gilkey on the Northwest Ag Information Network.
 

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