The new Red Fox potato has a very P.E.I. name —and is also a first in the history of the Prince Edward Island Potato Board. The Potato Board purchased the rights to the new variety from the Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada breeding program in Fredericton, New Brunswick, and is now bringing it to the commercial market, as Nancy Russell reports for CBC News.
“This is the first time that the board has worked with a new potato variety right from scratch,” said Mary Kay Sonier, seed co-ordinator with the potato board. “Through a bid process, we gained access to commercialize the variety.”
Sonier said the variety now known as the Red Fox had been on the board’s radar for several years before the bid.
“We were attracted to this by the skin, by the type. It also seemed to have very good yield potential in some different environmental areas,” Sonier said. “In our taste tests, it’s done all right, and it seemed to compare very favourably with the standards.”
