Grain Alliance (Barishevka Grain Company LLC), a large agricultural producer in Ukraine, has received a license for planting seed flax, the company has reported on its website. “This year we received a license to grow seed flax. We are the only one in Ukraine that will do this,” said Oleksiy Kotliar, Director of Chernihiv region LLC (Barishevka Grain Company).
He also pointed out good harvests of flax in the region and added that for the third year the company will sow oil flax.
In addition to conventional crops – wheat, corn, sunflower, soybeans, this year the company plans to sow new varieties imported from Canada – bare-grained oats, simple oats and spring wheat, Kotliar said.
In 2009, the founders of Harvest Moon East LLC (Baryshivka, Kyiv region) and BZK Grain Alliance (Sweden) created a joint company – Grain Alliance.
Grain Alliance cultivates around 50,000 ha of farmland in Kyiv, Cherkasy, Poltava, Khmelnytsky and Chernihiv regions.
The company has five silos in Kyiv and Poltava regions and a seed post-harvesting plant with an annual capacity of 30,000 tonnes.
Delta Tex LLC, which develops the Colin’s youth clothing store network in Ukraine, plans to open more than ten new stores in the next two years, as well as launch an online store by the end of May 2018. “I think we will launch an online store at the end of May-June … Over the next two years we plan to open about ten more stores, so we will have 75 stores in different cities,” Colin’s Ukraine Sales Director Volkan Peker said, speaking at the Retail & Development Business Expo 2018 exhibition held in Kyiv last week.
The first Colin’s brand store in Ukraine was opened in 2000.
As of the end of March 2018 the network had 62 stores with a total area of 21,000 square meters in 29 cities of Ukraine. Thus, the Ukrainian market is the third for the network after Turkey and Russia.
Colin’s is part of Eroglu Holding (Istanbul, Turkey), established in 1983. As of the end of March 2018 Colin’s network had about 600 stores in 38 countries. Delta Tex LLC was established in 2010.
The European Bank for Recontruction and Development (EBRD) would provide a loan to Nova Poshta, the leader in express delivry in Ukraine, for its development.
The two sides of the loan agreement confirmed their plans. The sum of the loan is not disclosed. The EBRD has not yet posted information about the loan on its website. According to the rules of the bank, it can decide not to publish information about a loan which is smaller than $20 million. The details of the agreement and development plans will be announced at a joint press conference on April 4, 2018. Nova Poshta, founded in 2001, is the leader in the local delivery market. The company’s network consists of more than 2,300 depots. In 2017, Nova Poshta delivered more than 145 million items.
Ukraine in January-March 2018 reduced natural gas imports by 56.5% (by 2.404 billion cubic meters) compared to the same period in 2017, to 1.819 billion cubic meters, according to data from PJSC Ukrtransgaz. According to calculations made by Interfax-Ukraine, in particular 1.248 billion cubic meters were received from Slovakia in January-March 2018 (65.7% less compared to January-March 2017), 339.7 million cubic meters from Hungary (37% up), and 231.1 million cubic meters from Poland (31.3% down).
Imports in March 2018 amounted to 673.9 million cubic meters of gas, which is 52.4% less than in March 2017 (1.403 billion cubic meters).
At the same time, Ukraine has not imported natural gas under the contract with Gazprom for more than two years (since November 26, 2015), purchasing it exclusively on its western border.
Ukrtransgaz, 100% owned by Naftogaz Ukrainy, operates a system of trunk gas pipelines and 12 underground gas storage facilities in the country.
Air Malta airline plans to resume regular flights from Malta to Kyiv from June 19. According to a posting on the website of the airline, the flights will be serviced on Tuesdays. It will take around three hours to get to the Boryspil international airport. The fares start from $190 for a round trip.
Air Malta flied to Kyiv several years ago. Air Malta connects Malta with over 35 major cities across Europe and the Mediterranean.
The International Finance Corporation (IFC) would provide a long-term loan of up to $30 million to Ukrainian agroholding Astarta. According to a posting on the website of the IFC, the decision was made by the IFC Board on March 23. This program aims to improve resource efficiency at the company’tiss processing facilities through the implementation of Best Available Technology (BAT) that is technology for limiting pollutant discharges; and at improving farming and trading of grains and oilseeds through financing of farming equipment and storage facilities.
The IFC said that this will be the fourth program of cooperation with Astarta, starting from 2012. Astarta is a vertically integrated agro-industrial holding operating in Poltava, Vinnytsia, Khmelnytsky, Ternopil, Zhytomyr, Chernihiv, Cherkasy and Kharkiv regions.
