This Sunday, almost a billion Muslims around the world celebrate the main Islamic holiday – the Day of Sacrifice, also known as Eid al-Adha and Eid al-Fitr.
Every Muslim who has the means to do so is obliged to sacrifice an animal, and one person can limit himself to a sheep, while one head of cattle is enough for a group of up to ten adherents of Islam. In this case, the animal must be young enough and without physical defects. Two-thirds of the victim’s meat should be distributed to the poor, and the rest goes to the family’s festive meal.
The sacrifice is performed by Muslims in memory of how the Prophet Ibrahim was ready to sacrifice his son Ismail to the Almighty to prove his devotion to God. However, the Almighty, having tested Ibrahim, stopped the hand raised over his son and sent Ibrahim a white lamb, which was sacrificed.
During Eid al-Adha, it is customary to wear the best clothes, visit friends, give gifts, and visit the graves of loved ones.
In Saudi Arabia, the sacrifice holiday is the culmination of the Hajj, the annual Muslim pilgrimage to the holy sites of Mecca and Medina. This year, more than 1.5 million believers gathered there.
Sotheby’s will hold the largest ever auction of luxury champagne next week, the Financial Times reports.
The auction house will put up for auction in Paris about 1.5 thousand bottles of vintage champagne from the collection of Taiwanese billionaire Pierre Chen.
Among the rarities will be a lot of five bottles of Salon Le Mesnil, Blanc de Blancs 1971, estimated at 18 thousand euros. Bidders will also be able to compete for champagne from leading brands, including Krug, Dom Perignon, Salon and Roederer, including those from the 1950s.
This is the second of five international auctions to sell 25 thousand bottles of Chen’s wines. The first one took place last November in Hong Kong and brought in $16.8 million.
Profitability of the main types of agricultural crops has been steadily improving since 2023, but the production of cereals has not yet reached break-even, and the profitability of oilseeds remains minimal, in 2024 the profitability of oilseeds will be higher than previously predicted, and the production of cereals will remain unprofitable. The corresponding forecast is contained in the study of the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food and the Ukrainian Club of Agrarian Business (UCAB).
“The improvement in the level of profitability compared to the previous period is due to the restoration of export sea routes. This reduced the cost of logistics and allowed to increase purchase prices in the domestic market, even despite the decline in world prices for all types of grains and oilseeds,” the analysts said.
According to their information, over the past six months, prices at elevators have increased by 38% for grain crops and 14% for oilseeds compared to the same period last year. Prices in Ukrainian ports have also increased, but not so significantly, as the cost of logistics remains quite high. At the same time, purchase prices in the Ukrainian market are still far behind the world market.
Since the beginning of 2024, the structure of export routes has changed. Logistics of agro-products through the Danube river ports played an important role for Ukraine when the deep-water ports of Odessa did not work. But today the potential of the Danube export route is not fully utilized due to the higher cost of logistics in this direction compared to the deep-water ports of Odessa, the experts reminded.
The trend towards lower average fertilizer application rates in the industry continues. Although an increase in fertilizer application rates for winter crops was recorded in the autumn of 2023, in the spring of 2024 application rates decreased again – on average by 5% compared to the same period last year. The main reasons for the decrease in fertilizer application rates are the lack of working capital and rising cost of fertilizers due to changes in the Customs Code and the general situation of uncertainty in the industry due to the war.
Analysts noted that large producers practically did not reduce fertilizer application rates, while small farmers were forced to reduce them by an average of 10-15%. Application rates of plant protection products remained at the same level, because a reduction in the use of crop protection products can lead to deterioration in yields and quality of grain and oilseed crops.
According to the results of 2024, the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and UCAB forecast a higher level of profitability of crop production compared to the previous forecast. Sunflower profitability is expected at $45/t (-$4/t in 2023), soybeans at $83/t ($69), and rapeseed at $78/t ($5/t). Grain production, on the other hand, will remain unprofitable.
“The results of crop production this year will be most influenced by such factors as reduction of fertilizer application rates and, as a consequence, a slight decrease in yields, as well as reducing the cost of export logistics, reducing the price gap between prices at elevators and Ukrainian ports due to the establishment of export shipments, which will contribute to a more active recovery of domestic purchase prices”, – stated analysts.
In May 2024, the Export Credit Agency (ECA) supported UAH 1.23 billion of exports, while since the beginning of the year this amount amounted to UAH 2.93 billion, according to the ECA website.
It is specified that one hryvnia of ECA’s insurance liability has generated UAH 11.15 of future export revenue as of today.
Among ECA’s partner banks, MTB Bank provided the largest financing to Ukrainian exporters in May (UAH 79.2 million), and it also supported the largest exports – by UAH 911.2 million. It is followed by Ukrgasbank (UAH 182 million of supported exports and UAH 28.2 million of loans issued) and Oschadbank (UAH 80.8 million and UAH 17.1 million, respectively) in the top three in May.
Since the beginning of the year, the leader among banks is Urgasbank, which has provided export loans worth UAH 120.5 million, thus securing UAH 1.75 billion in future revenue.
Among the regions, Kyiv (UAH 911.2 million), Ivano-Frankivsk (UAH 158.4 million), and Lviv (UAH 165.2 million) regions were the most active users of ECA insurance to develop export potential in May, while partner countries included Poland (UAH 660.7 million), Denmark (UAH 197.6 million), and the Netherlands (UAH 158.4 million). The most popular export products include milk and dairy products, processed vegetables, alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages.
The situation in the Ukrainian energy system next week will be perceptibly more difficult compared to the current week, said the Chairman of the Board of the NEC Ukrenergo Volodymyr Kudrytskyy.
“Next week will be more difficult for the energy system, because the heat wave will return and we will have a reduced capacity of nuclear power plants, if compared to the current week,” he said in an interview with Ukrayinska Pravda on Friday.
According to the NEC head, due to the massive shelling, the energy system has lost its reserve of strength and has become dependent on sudden changes in electricity consumption and weather, forcing it to balance by shutting down consumers.
“Our energy system, having lost more than 9 GW of capacity due to shelling, now has no reserve of strength. If earlier we had additional power plants that could be switched on promptly, we would overlap by switching on some hydro units or TPP units, now we simply do not have such a maneuver,” – explained Kudrytskyy.”
As previously reported, Energoatom announced that it would put a 1000 MW nuclear power plant unit under repair as part of a planned repair campaign in 2024. The company pointed out that, given this and the increase in electricity consumption in July, the generation deficit in the power system may increase.
Prime Minister Denys Shmygal noted that saving e/e will be part of Ukraine’s daily life in the coming years due to Russian attacks on the country’s energy sector.
In January-May this year, Ukraine reduced exports of titanium ores and concentrate in physical terms by 43.1% year-on-year to 3,207 thousand tons.
According to statistics released by the State Customs Service (SCS) on Thursday, exports of titanium ores and concentrate decreased by 43.5% to $5.303 million in monetary terms.
The main exports were to Turkey (68.87% of supplies in monetary terms), the Philippines (6.32%) and Poland (5.83%).
At the same time, experts point to inconsistencies in the statistics on titanium ore exports. In particular, at the request of Interfax-Ukraine, Velta Production and Commercial Firm (PCF) LLC with titanium ore mining assets in Novomyrhorod (Kirovohrad region) reported that in January-February 2024 alone, the company exported more than 15 thousand tons of ilmenite (titanium concentrate) to the Czech Republic and Mexico. At the same time, experts believe that the GTS provides data only on the supply of rutile (also a titanium-containing ore).
In five months of 2024, Ukraine imported 56 tons of titanium ore from China worth $86 thousand.
As reported, in 2023, Ukraine reduced exports of titanium ore in physical terms by 96.4% compared to 2022 – to 11,648 thousand tons, while revenue decreased by 85.1% to $19.426 million. At the same time, the main exports were made to Turkey (38.21% of supplies in monetary terms), Japan (16.53%) and India (6.12%).
During this period, Ukraine imported 1 ton of such ore from the Netherlands for $2 thousand.
In 2022, Ukraine decreased exports of titanium ore by 41.8% year-on-year to 322.143 thousand tons, and by 19.6% in monetary terms to $130.144 million. The main exports were made to the Czech Republic (47.91% of supplies in monetary terms), the United States (11.94%) and Romania (9.75%).
In 2022, Ukraine imported 196 tons of similar products from Senegal (70.41%) and Turkey (29.59%) for $115 thousand.
In Ukraine, titanium ores are currently mined mainly by the United Mining and Chemical Company (UMCC), which manages Vilnohirsk Mining and Metallurgical Plant (VGMK, Dnipro region) and Irshansk Mining and Metallurgical Plant (Irshansk, Dnipro region). ) and Irshansk Mining and Processing Plant (IGOK, Zhytomyr region), as well as Mezhirichinsky GOK and Valky Ilmenite (both based in Irshansk, Zhytomyr region). In addition, Velta (Dnipro) has built a mining and processing plant at Birzulivske deposit with a capacity of 240 thousand tons of ilmenite concentrate per year.
In addition, Velta, a Dnipro-based industrial and commercial company, has built a mining and processing plant at the Birzulivske deposit with an annual capacity of 240 thousand tons of ilmenite concentrate.
