Areas planted with leguminous crops in 2018 were expanded by 12.4% compared with the previous year, to 568,400 ha, while their harvest fell by 15.9%, to 1.04 million, according to the UkrAgroConsult analytical agency. “Despite the decline in prices and profitability, the area planted with legumes actually increased this year. At the same time, there was a decrease in yield, but the weather factor worked here. One can argue how negative the weather factor is, which affected the decrease in yield, decrease in supply, but it is quite possible it contributed to the prices. The conclusion we are making is that farmers continue to trust legumes,” Director General of the UkrAgroConsult analytical agency Serhiy Feofilov said at a conference in Kyiv.
He said that the export of legumes will be high this season.
“This year, the export of peas will fall quite strongly. Earlier, in the structure of exports from Ukraine, chickpeas dominated, now horse beans and beans, and lentils have recently sold well. According to the nuances of logistics, if two or four years ago up to 90% legumes were exported from Ukraine by containers, but now the situation has changed and up to 60% is exported in bulk and mainly this is export of peas,” Feofilov said.
According to him, in the outlook of three to five years, the drivers of the development of the legume market of the Black Sea region will be: stable growth in demand, the need to restore crop rotation after oversaturation with oilseed crops, attractiveness both for large farms (peas, large batches) and for small farms (other legumes), differentiation of the commodity nomenclature for farms, new trends in healthy nutrition from the use of legumes.
According to Ukraine’s Agricultural Policy and Food Ministry, global demand for legumes is growing faster than supply. Today, the largest producers of legumes in the world are India, China and Canada.
“Ukraine has all the prerequisites to become one of the key producers of these products and a supplier of legumes to the global market,” Deputy Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food on European Integration Olha Trofimtseva said.
According to her, Ukrainian exports of legumes are growing significantly. The main buyers of Ukrainian products are India, Turkey, Pakistan, Myanmar and the Netherlands.
“In 2015, we exported legumes to the amount of $60.6 million, in 2017 – $148.5 million, and for the results of January-October, this figure is $97.7 million,” the deputy minister said.
Ukraine as of November 26, 2018 fully used 10 quotas for duty free exports of food under a Free Trade Area (FTA) agreement with the European Union (EU), particular, quotas for honey, cereals, malt and wheat gluten, preserved tomatoes, grape and apple juices, wheat and corn, butter and poultry.
According to a posting on the website of the Ukrainian Agribusiness Club (UCAB), Ukraine also almost fully used quotas for starch (95%) and garlic (96%).
The UCAB reminded that from October 1, 2018 the second year of additional quotas for five groups of goods began, and two groups have been already closed (honey and preserved tomatoes).
“Before the end of the year, additional quotas for grain will be in effect, of which the volume for wheat and corn has already been used, and only 23% is used for barley,” the UCAB said.
As reported, in January-October 2018, exports of agricultural products from Ukraine amounted to $14.8 billion, which is $165 million more than a year earlier.
In addition to quotas for Ukraine, quotas on duty free import of goods from EU countries to Ukraine are still in effect. These include quotas for the following groups of goods – sugar, poultry meat (primary and secondary quotas) and pork (primary and secondary quotas).
Ukraine as of November 29 threshed 67.6 million tonnes of grain and leguminous crops from 14.5 million hectares (98% of the target) with the yield of 4.72 tonnes per hectare, the press service of Ukraine’s Agricultural Policy and Food Ministry has reported.
Some 34.3 million tonnes of early grain and leguminous crops was harvested from 9.9 million hectares with a yield of 3.48 tonnes per hectare, while 33.3 million tonnes of maize was gathered from 4.3 million hectares (95%) with a yield of 7.69 tonnes per hectare, Ukraine’s Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food said.
The yield of buckwheat was 136,000 tonnes harvested from 108,000 hectares (99%), or 1.26 tonnes per hectare; that of millet was 78,000 tonnes from 51,000 hectares (98%), or 1.54 tonnes per hectare.
What is more, Ukrainian farmers threshed 13.8 million tonnes of sunflower seeds from 6 million hectares (99.8%) with a yield of 2.28 tonnes per hectare; 4.3 million tonnes of soybeans from 1.7 million hectares (99%) with a yield of 2.58 tonnes per hectare; 2.7 million tonnes of rapeseeds from 1 million hectares with a yield of 2.61 tonnes per hectare.
The yield of sugar beets was 13.5 million tonnes from 273,000 hectares (98% of the plan), or 49.4 tonnes per hectare.
Ukrainian farmers have sowed 7.1 million hectares with winter grain crops (the plan is 7.2 million hectares) and 1 million hectares with winter rapeseeds (116% of the plan).
The ministry expects Ukraine’s grain yield in 2018 will grow by 2 million tonnes compared to 2017, to 64 million tonnes.
Construction of new grain and oilseeds transshipment facilities at the Mykolaiv seaport will start in the rear of berth eight. Private investment will total over UAH 1.2 billion, the Ukrainian Sea Port Authority has reported. “We are investing our own funds and are actively cooperating with port operators and private businesses. This is the development of the berth and rear infrastructure of berths zero and eight. This will increase the capacity of the Mykolaiv port for processing grain by more than 2 million tonnes per year, oil – by 750,000 tonnes per year,” Head of the Ukrainian Sea Port Authority Raivis Veckagans said during a working visit to the Mykolaiv seaport.
The Ukrainian Sea Port Authority refused to name investors, adding that this would be a new cooperation for the port. The Ukrainian Sea Port Authority plans to allocate UAH 350 million within the framework of fulfilling the company’s obligations under a public private partnership project for the construction and dredging of berth eight. At the same time, private investment in infrastructure will amount to over UAH 1.2 billion.
According to the Ukrainian Sea Port Authority, the planned grain complex will have a storage capacity of 96,000 tonnes, a warehouse – 40,000 tonnes, as well as other support facilities. Earlier, the Infrastructure Ministry reported that COFCO (China National Cereals, Oils and Foodstuffs Corporation) is ready to invest up to $30 million in the berth capacity of the Mykolaiv port and river logistics.
Seaside Terminal intends to invest about UAH 120 million in the reconstruction of the Mykolaiv-Vantazhny railway station in order to increase its capacity.
FACILITIES, GRAIN, INVESTMENT, MYKOLAIV, OILSEEDS, SEAPORT, TRANSSHIPMENT
Some 72% of Ukrainians are ready to support a woman candidate in the presidential elections if the party they trust nominated her as a presidential candidate, according to a study by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS) conducted in October-November 2018. Only 36% of respondents expressed readiness to support a Jewish candidate, and 26% said they would vote for a dark-skinned candidate.
“Compared to 2011, when we first conducted such a survey, the support of women and Jews remained almost unchanged, while more people, from 18% to 26%, said they would support a dark-skinned candidate, KIIS said.
The study was similar to that conducted by Gallup in the United States since 1937. At the same time, the report notes that in 2015, for each of these three questions (about women, Jews and blacks), more than 90% of Americans (92%, 91% and 92%, respectively) said they were ready to vote for them.
However, previously these figures were lower in the United States. “Attitudes of Americans towards women candidates increased as a whole. Ukrainian data correspond to American data from the early 1970s,” KIIS said.
Ukrainian attitudes towards candidates of Jewish nationality and blacks are significantly lower than they were in the United States for the entire observation period. In particular, in 1937 only 46% of Americans responded positively to a question about Jewish candidates, and 37% of respondents answered positively to a question about dark-skinned candidates in 1958, when it was asked in interviews.
The all-Ukrainian public opinion poll of KIIS was conducted from October 26 to November 8, 2018. Some 2,044 people living in 110 settlements throughout Ukraine were questioned in a personal interview. The margin of error of the poll does not exceed 3.3%.
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has said that the European Commission has made a favorable decision on the provision of a first tranche of the fourth macrofinancial assistance of the European Union (EU) to Ukraine in the amount of EUR 500 million and thanked the European Commission for its decision. “Sincerely grateful to the European Commission for positive decision to disburse to Ukraine first tranche of the 4th EU macrofinancial assistance program in the amount of EUR 500 mln,” Poroshenko said on its Facebook page on Friday.
