The demand for complete potato processing lines has increased over the past few years and with an unprecedented amount of new lines installed including green-field projects. Worldwide, a lot of new potato processing lines are being built, not only by existing potato processors in Europe but also by new players in other parts of the world such as Argentina, China and Turkey.
The demand for complete solutions for potato processing lines is growing, a fact which is underlined by the increase in demand for potato products all over the world. Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands for example, have seen a noticeable growth regarding potato processing capacity. Also, outside Europe we see that China and South America are huge growth markets in terms of consumption of frozen potato products.
Times are changing
Our potato industry is changing and now unlike in the old days, designing and manufacturing processing equipment is rather more complex than welding some stainless steel together. The role of automation becomes even more important with capacities increasing. So does the integration of all the processing and packaging equipment, both in mechanical as well electrical terms, as a medium size French fries plant can easily consist of more than 150 single machines. Kiremko is of the opinion that it should be able to offer much more than the best quality equipment only. In the past 20 years, Kiremko has developed a way of working which is totally project based.
“Whether we deliver a turnkey project or a single machine, our company will apply the same working methods and attention to the customer’s project. Also, our customers do not always employ complete project teams in-house anymore as it is hard to justify in terms of cost. Increasingly we see the need for a minimum number of different suppliers taking care of the project and more responsibilities shifting to one supplier. We see this trend throughout the market, from the top 5 potato processors as well as newcomers in emerging countries. Companies are looking for a total solution, a reliable partner that will realize a working process line from A to Z, delivered in time and within budget.”
