Argentina Moves to the Center of a Consolidating Global Potato Industry

In recent years, the global potato industry has entered a phase of rapid consolidation. Mergers, acquisitions, and geographic expansions are redefining who produces, who decides, and who supplies. What is happening in Argentina in those segments that, globally, have seen major corporate moves? 

Mergers Setting the Global Course 

In Europe, the Dutch group HZPC announced the acquisition of IPM Potato Group, Ireland’s leading exporter of certified seed, strengthening its position in the British and Mediterranean markets. With this transaction, HZPC not only expands its production area in Scotland and the Netherlands, but also consolidates a genetic network spanning from the North Atlantic to Africa and Asia. 

For its part, U.S.-based Simplot completed the purchase of Belgium’s Clarebout Potatoes, one of Europe’s largest frozen potato processors. The merger combines Simplot’s financial muscle and industrial scale with Clarebout’s technological capabilities in value-added products—a pairing that reinforces global control over industrial potatoes and export flows. 

Both moves send a clear signal: the potato business is concentrating in fewer hands, and leading companies are seeking to integrate the entire chain—from seed to plate—under a single logic of control. 

Argentina on the Map: Mar del Plata, a New Regional Hub 

Against this backdrop of global consolidation, Lamb Weston Holdings, the U.S. french-fry giant, inaugurated in 2025 a 40,000 m² plant in Mar del Plata, Buenos Aires Province. They are not the first—McCain has been in the region for more than 20 years—but they do revive a forgotten idea: Mar del Plata has enormous potential as a regional hub. 

The project—one of the largest in the recent history of Argentina’s food sector—processes about 200 million pounds of potatoes per year, creates 250 direct jobs and 3,000 indirect ones, and supplies both the domestic and regional markets: 80% of production will be exported to Brazil via the Port of Mar del Plata, which is now positioning itself as a new logistics hub for Argentina’s agro-industrial trade. 

The plant marks a turning point: for the first time in a long while, a top-tier multinational has decided to install industrial capacity in the Southern Cone to serve the Latin American market, instead of supplying it from the United States or Europe. 

Argentina thus moves from being an importer of technology and know-how to becoming an export platform for finished products—generating high-impact logistical, agricultural, and technological spillovers. 

The Other Side of the Business: Genetics and Seed Exports 

Meanwhile, Argentina’s certified seed segment is experiencing its own awakening. 

International companies such as HZPC and STET are working with local partners to produce and export seed to Uruguay, Paraguay, and Brazil, with new destinations in Central America also on the horizon. 

Likewise, agreements between Germicopa (France) and Argentina’s Agroplant aim to expand the varietal offering and develop genetics adapted to the Southern Cone, combining European expertise with local multiplication capacity. 

For the first time, Argentina is exporting not only industrial potato products but also knowledge and genetic material—two intangible assets that were previously almost exclusively imported. 

This represents a paradigm shift: the country is positioning itself as a regional supplier of quality seed—an intermediate link between European laboratories and Latin American growers. 

Where Does Argentina Stand in the Eyes of Major Corporations? 

Today, multinational players view Argentina as a fertile yet complex terrain. On the one hand, the country combines natural advantages (soil, temperate climate, counter-seasonality, port infrastructure) and a strong agronomic tradition; on the other, it carries a volatile macroeconomic environment and trade restrictions that limit the free flow of inputs and exports. 

To HZPC, STET, Lamb Weston, and Simplot, Argentina is a long-term bet: a relatively closed market with strong technical human capital—ideal for piloting regional integration models. 

An export hub to Brazil and the South Atlantic, with logistics costs competitive against Asia.

An emerging source of adapted genetics, capable of supplying the wide range of Latin American climates. 

The challenge will be to maintain clear rules, ensure stability, and foster partnerships that promote technology transfer. If it succeeds, Argentina can move from observer to one of the most relevant nodes on Latin America’s potato map.

From the Periphery to the Center

The major mergers reveal a world where decisions are made far from the fields. But Lamb Weston’s opening in Mar del Plata and the rise of Argentina’s seed-export market show that the South can also innovate, produce, and lead.

The question is not whether major corporations are looking at Argentina—they already are—but whether the country will capitalize on that attention to establish itself as a strategic partner rather than merely a supplier.