Ukraine is ramping up agricultural exports this year and next, according to its deputy minister for agrarian policy & food – but the country is still facing multiple challenges with agrifoods production levels because of the Russian invasion.
Minister Golovnya Vitaliy said at a press conference on Thursday morning that Ukraine expected to export more than 50 million tonnes of crucial crops, including wheat, oils and soy, in the upcoming 2024/25 season.
Export forecasts point to around 40 million tonnes in grains and 12 million tonnes of oilseeds.
Agrifoods exports picked up again in August of last year, Vitaliy pointed out, when Ukraine launched its own Black Sea shipping corridor near Romania and Bulgaria. This came just a month after Russia quit a year-long landmark deal brokered by the UN and Turkey that had allowed the safe trade of nearly 33 million tonnes of Ukraine grain even during the conflict.
He said this was helping exports return to their pre-war levels.
However, the country’s total agricultural production is still struggling as Ukraine continues to face a swathe of logistics challenges due to its ongoing conflict with Russia, as well as the effects of climate change on crops, Vitaliy warned.
According to preliminary estimates, the expected gross production of grains and legumes in the 2024/25 marketing year may amount to about 55.9 million tonnes, which is 8% lower than last year’s gross harvest.
The production of oil crops in the 2024/2025 marketing year is also expected to drop 15% to 20.7 million tonnes, compared with the same period last year.
The deputy food and agriculture minister said this was largely due to the loss of land since the start of the invasion in February 2022.
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“Ukraine has lost about 19% of land since the start of the aggression,” he said, adding that unfavourable weather conditions had also affected output of certain crops like wheat and sunflower oil.
Soybean production, on the other hand, had increased by 2.2 times from the 2020/21 marketing year. Ukraine is the largest soy producer in Europe.
Ukrainian farmers have also been shifting production of crops because of logistical challenges, turning away from oil seed plants and grains and investing towards areas such soy.
Still, the forecast volumes of production of grain and oil crops, together with the residues from last year, will “fully provide for Ukraine’s internal food needs and create a powerful export potential in the 2024/25 marketing year”, Vitaliy said.
The state was also prioritising the demining of land to help farmers increase their output, he said. Agriculture is a central part of the eastern European nation’s economy, representing around 8% of its GDP.
Vitaliy said the country was “especially grateful to the EU for its financial support which can then be transferred into support for farmers”.
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The country is continuing to position itself as an agriculture powerhouse, despite Russia’s attacks, as it nears its EU accession date. When asked when that would be, the deputy minister said, “when both the EU and Ukraine are ready”.
Vitaliy spoke to journalists just as the Ukrainian cabinet was in the midst of a major shake-up, with a series of ministers resigning and being voted out of parliament this week, including foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba.
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