The Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine (AMCU) has launched an investigation into the reasons for the increase in prices for chicken eggs in October 2024, the agency’s press service reports.
According to the regulator’s website, the AMCU has already sent requests for information directly to chicken egg producers, their sellers, and feed producers, whose cost is one of the main components of the cost of chicken eggs.
The regulator reminded that this is not the first time it has responded to the situation with rising egg prices. Thus, in October 2022, a study was launched to investigate the reasons for the increase in prices for chicken eggs in domestic retail chains. The study collected and analyzed information from market participants at each of the stages of the product’s circulation from the producer to the end consumer.
The AMCU also noted that it has expanded the scope of the study on this group of goods, which was launched in September-October 2022, and extended it until October 2024.
“After receiving responses from market participants and further analysis of all factors influencing the pricing behavior of business entities at each of the links in the commodity circulation, final conclusions will be formed on the presence or absence of signs of violation of the legislation on the protection of economic competition in the actions of the participants in the commodity market involved,” the AMCU summarized.
As reported, in October, Ukraine set record high prices for chicken eggs, which exceeded the threshold of 60 UAH per dozen. The Union of Poultry Breeders of Ukraine explained this by the delayed reaction of poultry farmers who worked at a loss in the summer of 2024, while the cost of feed and electricity has risen significantly and the industry cannot work at a loss anymore.
Agro-Region has reduced the cost of grain and oilseeds transportation by up to 30% by creating its own fleet of 40 grain carriers, the company’s press service reported on its Facebook page.
“As of today, 58 thousand tons of grains and oilseeds have been exported, with the balance for export of more than 60 thousand tons, including 30 thousand tons of corn and wheat,” said Oleksandr Tymoshenko, commercial director of the agricultural holding, adding that sunflower and rapeseed were the most profitable in the 2024 season due to higher prices than a year earlier.
Agro-Region pointed out that the main volumes of agricultural products are transported by rail and road to ports, and then the grain is exported by sea. Several factors contributed to the reduction in transportation costs, including the company’s own grain carrier fleet, which guarantees flexibility in planning and a fixed cost of transportation.
“Agro-Region received 25 hopper cars as part of the USAID Economic Support for Ukraine grant program. After that, it raised additional funds and invested them in an additional 15 railcars.
Agro-Region owns a land bank of 39 thousand hectares in Kyiv, Chernihiv, Zhytomyr, and Khmelnytskyi regions. It specializes in crop production. It consists of 11 companies organized into four crop production clusters. It has two elevators – Boryspil elevator with a capacity of 73 thousand tons and Miropil elevator with a capacity of 52 thousand tons.
Agro-Region’s annual harvest of grains and oilseeds is up to 200 thousand tons.
In April 2021, the Swedish company Lobiu Sala AB, owned by the former Minister of Economy of Ukraine Aivaras Abromavičius, received permission from the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine to buy the Swedish Agro Region Stockholm Holding, which manages the Agro-Region group of companies in Ukraine.
Agrane Agro Holding has modernized the grain receiving infrastructure at the Service Grain elevator complex (Odesa region) and laid a 200-meter railway line to it, the group’s press service reports.
According to the report, the newly laid railway line allows the company to ship up to 30 cars per day, which reduces the cost and speeds up the delivery of grain to ports.
In addition, Service Grain has equipped three hubs for receiving grain from trucks, including heavy trucks (up to 20 m long). With a total capacity of 2,000 tons, the elevator complex is ready to receive grain up to 1,700 tons per day.
According to the agroholding, the storage capacity of the complex, which is equipped with equipment from the domestic manufacturer KMZ Industries, has already reached 100 thousand tons.
“Thanks to the introduction of modern technologies, the elevator can simultaneously accept and ship both large and small batches of grain in a short time,” Agrane summarized.
“Agrain is engaged in the cultivation and storage of grains and oilseeds, as well as livestock farming. Before the full-scale Russian invasion, the agricultural holding included 11 agricultural enterprises. It cultivated about 110,000 hectares in Zhytomyr, Kharkiv, Chernihiv, Odesa, and Cherkasy regions.
The holding is owned by SAS Investcompagnie (France).
Ukraine’s economy in 2025 will grow by 4.9% with a slight decrease in inflation rate compared to this year to 8%, such macro forecast of Raiffeisen Bank (Kiev) was shared by the head of its board of directors Alexander Pisaruk.
“As for the dollar exchange rate, we expect devaluation of about 8% in 2025, and the exchange rate itself will be 45.5 UAH/$1 at the end of 2025. The baseline scenario is based on the hypothesis that security risks will improve from the second half of 2025,” he said in an interview with Interfax-Ukraine.
Pisaruk noted that the bank always does stress tests taking into account not only the baseline scenario, but also the best and worst case scenarios.
“But we do not have two fundamentally different development scenarios. All preliminary forecasts on the end of the war did not come true. The head of the NBU said this at the meeting of the European Business Association, and I am ready to sign these words that let’s stop predicting and making mistakes, and let’s just work,” – said at the same time the head of Raiffeisen.
According to him, even if the ceasefire is at the end of the first quarter, it will not dramatically affect performance in 2025.
“It could have an impact on 2026. So even such important things affect with a certain lag. 2025 will be influenced by the current dynamics of inflation growth and the need to curb it,” Pisaruk said.
He added that he would not be surprised if the National Bank has to raise the discount rate as a result of faster-than-expected acceleration of inflation.
“Regarding deposit and lending rates in hryvnia, we do not expect them to deviate significantly from current levels,” the banker pointed out.
He reminded that this process began back in July, and the main factor is the dynamics of the NBU discount rate, which is very likely to be stable until mid-summer 2025.
“But the rates on deposits in US dollars and euros may slightly decrease in response to the relevant decisions of the Fed and the ECB, although they remain quite low in Ukraine now,” – suggested the head of Raiffeisen Bank.
Commenting on the impact of the situation on the front on the mood of the population and business, he stated that this is reflected in the foreign exchange market.
“We observe a significant increase in demand for cash currency, although the supply also remains high. This leads to an increase in interventions by the National Bank, which, fortunately, has reserves for this purpose, formed at the expense of international currency aid,” Pisaruk said.
According to him, the situation now seems quite manageable, as the external aid next year looks sufficient to finance the budget deficit and replenish the NBU’s foreign exchange reserves. The CEO also said that Raiffeisen Bank remains the main supplier of cash currency to Ukraine.
“And who is number two, I don’t even know, because the gap is huge. This is a complicated business – you need to know the counterparties, provide logistics. We know how to do it and have been doing it for decades”, – he noted.
As reported, the GDP of Ukraine, according to the State Statistics Committee, in 2023 grew by 5.3% after a decline of 28.8% in 2022. The National Bank of Ukraine in late October raised the forecast of economic growth for 2024 from 3.7% to 4%, and for 2025 – from 4.1% to 4.3%. At the same time, the NBU in late October worsened the inflation forecast for 2024 from 8.5% to 9.7% and worsened it for 2025 from 6.6% to 6.9% after it fell to 5.1% in 2023 after jumping to 26.6% in 2022. The National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) on November 27 lowered the official hryvnia exchange rate to 41.6010 UAH/$1, the lowest value in its history. In general, since the beginning of 2024, the dollar at the official rate has appreciated by 9.5%, or by UAH 3.59, and since the transition of the National Bank on October 3, 2023 to the regime of managed flexibility – by 13.8%, or by UAH 5.03.
Quotes of interbank currency market of Ukraine (UAH for 1 PLN, in 01.07.2024-30.07.2024)
Open4Business.com.ua
Ukraine’s state budget has received $235 million in concessional financing from the Government of Japan under the World Bank’s new systemic projects, the Resilient, Inclusive and Environmentally Balanced Enterprise (RISE) and the Increasing Access to and Resilience of Education in Crisis-affected Ukraine (LEARN).
As the Ministry of Finance reported in a press release on Wednesday, the RISE program received a $130 million loan that will be used to address critical issues that hinder the growth and sustainable development of the private sector.
The Ministry clarified that the $105 million in Japanese funds received under the LEARN project is the result of the Ukrainian government’s implementation of measures to ensure safe face-to-face learning in schools by providing subventions for shelters and school buses in 2024.
The projects are implemented using the Program-for-results (PforR) financial instrument, when funds are allocated after Ukraine has achieved some of the results.
The Ministry of Finance noted that by the end of 2024, Ukraine expects to raise another $120 million and $95 million under RISE and LEARN, respectively.
