Idaho potato acres forecast to decline 5 percent

By Sean Ellis

Idaho Farm Bureau Federation

POCATELLO – Idaho potato acres could be down this year, according to spud growers who are facing high input costs and low farm-level potato prices well below the cost of production.

At least they should be down this year, those growers say.

“I expect acres to be less than last year,” says American Falls spud farmer Jim Tiede.

“I think they’ll be down for sure,” says Aberdeen spud farmer Ritchey Toevs.

In the April 2 edition of North American Potato Market News, owner Ben Eborn projects Idaho potato acres will be down 5 percent this year compared with 2025. If that is correct, it means Idaho farmers will plant 300,000 acres of spuds in 2026, down from 315,000 last year.

Idaho farmers planted 315,000 acres of potatoes in 2024 and 330,000 acres in 2023.

NAPMN expects U.S. farmers will plant 24,000 fewer potato acres this year, which would be 3 percent less than last year.

“The largest reduction is expected in Idaho,” the potato market news report states.

Tiede thinks the 5 percent estimate by NAPMN is a conservative one.

“I think it’s going to be more,” he says. “I think it’s going to be a big correction.”

Eborn says several factors are behind this year’s estimate of reduced U.S. potato acres.

“Growers across the country are extremely concerned about current market conditions, rising production costs, the lack of profitable alternative crops, the ability to obtain financing, increasing global competition, and limited irrigation water supplies,” he wrote in NAPMN. “In addition, North American growers also have a huge supply of potatoes from the 2025 crop in storage.”

Open-market potato prices are particularly bad right now and the industry desperately needs an acreage reduction to help better manage the supply and demand situation, says Hammett farmer Nick Blanksma.

He hopes potato acres are down significantly this year but is not holding his breath that they actually will be.

“I would be pleasantly surprised if Idaho growers planted 5 to 8 percent fewer acres this year, but I don’t think they will,” he says.

“The industry needs Idaho growers to plant less acres,” he adds.

“That’s why the market is the way it is; there’s too much supply.”

According to NAPMN’s Grower Return Index, open-market Idaho potatoes are selling for less than $2 per hundred pounds right now. That is far below the cost of production.

With 2026 shaping up to be a challenging water supply year in Idaho, water availability will be a major factor this year in how many acres of spuds farmers plant, Tiede says.

Tight water supplies should have farmers thinking about less water-intensive crops, like grains, he says. That said, he adds, the price situation for other crops isn’t much better than it is for potatoes right now.

But it costs a lot more to plant potatoes than it does to plant grains.

“This $2 spud market has got to make a few people think about an alternative crop,” Tiede says. “The price of wheat’s not much better, but at least you won’t lose as much.”

NAPMN estimates total U.S. spud acres at 878,000 this year, down from 902,000 last year, 932,000 in 2024 and 966,000 in 2023. If the 2026 estimate is correct, it would be the smallest U.S. potato acreage since 1952.

“Nevertheless, if the U.S. produces a trendline yield, like it did last year, this year’s expected acreage reduction may not be enough to significantly improve prices for open-market potatoes,” Eborn writes.

He estimates that Idaho growers would need to cut at least 20,000 acres of fresh potatoes to significantly improve open-market prices.

Some growers are hopeful but skeptical that will happen.

“Nothing seems to be pointing to a big reduction. I hope I’m wrong,” Toevs says.

USDA will publish its first estimate of U.S. potato acres at the end of June.

“We offer our projections as a substitute, for those who need to make plans for the upcoming season before USDA publishes its first potato acreage estimate,” Eborn writes. “Actual acreage may deviate from the projection for several reasons, including planting conditions, late changes in contract volumes, terms, and pricing, as well as grower reactions to this and other reports on planting intentions.”

Eborn says the NAPMN “forecast for Idaho’s 2026 potato area may be on the low side, depending on how many acres of uncontracted potatoes growers choose to plant.”