The agrarian ministries of Ukraine and Bulgaria are starting to develop a declaration on the mechanisms of influence in case of possible market shocks, including sharp price changes, in bilateral trade of sunflower oil, the press service of the Bulgarian Ministry of Agriculture said.
“The declaration is expected to signal the willingness of both sides to act together to prevent future market anomalies,” the Bulgarian agriculture ministry said in a statement following talks Friday in Sofia between Bulgarian Agriculture Minister Yavor Gechev and Ukrainian Agropolitics Minister Nikolai Solsky.
The sides discussed an emergency protective measure of the European Commission to temporarily ban imports from Ukraine of four crops – wheat, corn, canola and sunflower – in Bulgaria, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Hungary.
Gechev informed the participants of the negotiations about the Bulgarian government’s decision to lift the national ban on imports from Ukraine of a number of agricultural products and said the Bulgarian side will closely monitor the market both in terms of sunflower oil and other agricultural products.
“Bulgaria and Ukraine can work together to find long-term solutions for accelerated transit of agricultural goods to third countries and propose them to the European Commission,” the Bulgarian minister said.
He said that Bulgaria’s efforts are currently focused on the development of logistical systems through which solidarity corridors will function and fulfill the function for which they were created.
“Together we can face the challenges posed by the current situation and, in this way, solve them more quickly and efficiently,” Gechev stressed.
In turn, Nikolai Solski expressed the hope that the dialogue between the agrarian departments of the countries will continue. He assured his Bulgarian colleague that Ukraine was ready to jointly solve any arising issues in the future.
For its part, the Ukrainian Ministry of Agrarian Policy said after the talks that Bulgaria was ready to import all agricultural products from Ukraine, except for the four crops mentioned above.
