The Epicenter K Group, which was developing agricultural business under the Epicenter Agro brand in the past two years, plans to invest UAH 1.4 billion in construction and reconstruction of grain silos and UAH 665 million in the upgrade of agricultural machinery fleet in 2018. “Today, $150 million in hryvnia equivalent has been invested in what we already have [agricultural assets]. This year the investment component is UAH 2 billion, of which UAH 1.4 billion is the construction of new and reconstruction and expansion of operating silos and UAH 665 million for the renewal of equipment. The main sources of funding are idle funds of Epicenter,” General Director of Epicenter K Petro Mykhailishyn said at a press conference devoted to the development strategy of Epicenter K in the Ukrainian agrarian market.
He said that the turnover of Epicenter and Nova Linia hypermarket chains managed by the group amounted to UAH 42 billion in 2017.
As it was said at the press conference, the new agroholding has been operating on the Ukrainian market since 2015. During this time the group actively expanded its land bank, which is focused in Cherkasy, Khmelnytsky, Ternopil and Kyiv regions. The company plants four main crops: winter wheat, sunflower, corn and winter rapeseed.
“We started in 2016, having a land bank of 445 hectares. Today, we have 110,000 hectares of land officially registered with contracts with the land owners… When we realized that companies that have imported components in their activities are trying to become exporters, we chose the path of agribusiness… The plan for this year on the purchase of imported goods is $170 million, and we exported agricultural products for $50 million last year. There is a gap. We need to increase exports three times to hedge our financial risks,” Mykhailishyn said.
