The enterprises of Astarta, Ukraine’s largest sugar producer, have completed the spring sowing campaign on 146,000 hectares, responding quickly to the weather conditions of the season, the agricultural holding’s press service reported on Facebook.
“This year’s spring sowing took place under challenging weather conditions: abnormally high temperatures in March and frosts in April. Low soil moisture reserves after winter and their rapid decline due to early temperature rises forced the team to act quickly and in a coordinated manner. During a short “window” of favorable conditions, our divisions coordinated the entire complex of spring field work, completing sowing in the shortest possible time,” said Andriy Zagorulko, director of the crop production, logistics, and mechanization department of the agricultural holding.
Astarta noted that in the 2025 season, the crop structure will be as follows: sugar beets – 34,000 hectares, soybeans – 56,000 hectares, winter wheat – 46,000 hectares, sunflowers – 29,000 hectares, rapeseed – 11,000 hectares, corn – 14,000 hectares, and organic crops – 2,000 hectares.
Farmers are currently continuing to care for their crops, constantly monitoring their condition, moisture levels, and phytosanitary status. The production team is actively preparing for the start of the early grain harvest, which will begin in less than two months.
Astarta is a vertically integrated agro-industrial holding operating in eight regions of Ukraine. It comprises six sugar factories, agricultural enterprises with a land bank of 220,000 hectares, dairy farms with 22,000 head of cattle, an oil extraction plant in Hlobyn (Poltava region), seven elevators, and a biogas complex.
” In the first nine months of 2024, Astarta increased its net profit by 35.1% compared to the same period in 2023, to EUR75.60 million, revenue grew by 12.6% to EUR441.46 million, and EBITDA by 12.8% to $131.56 million.
IMC Agro Holding started the 2025 spring sowing campaign on April 16 and plans to plant 64.8 thou hectares of corn and 24.9 thou hectares of sunflower, the company’s press service reports.
“Despite the rainy and cold start to spring, as well as frequent air raids, thanks to timely tillage operations in the fall of 2024, the company managed to start the current year’s sowing campaign on time,” said Bohdan Kryvitsky, Chief Operating Officer of IMC.
He expressed confidence that due to the quality upgrade of equipment, IMC will be able to meet the optimal deadlines.
“All inventories have been purchased and delivered, the machinery is in good working order, and all production personnel are ready to lay the foundation for the upcoming spring crops,” Mr. Krivitsky emphasized.
As reported, in the fall of 2024, IMC sowed winter wheat on an area of 20.7 thou hectares, which is about 17% of the company’s land bank.
IMC Agro Holding is an integrated group of companies operating in Sumy, Poltava and Chernihiv regions (north and center of Ukraine) in the crop production, elevators and warehouses segments. The company has a land bank of about 120 thousand hectares and storage capacities of 554 thousand tons, with a harvest of 1.002 million tons in 2023.
In January-September 2024, IMC increased its revenue to $140.8 million, up 43% compared to the same period in 2023. The increase in normalized EBITDA in January-September 2024, as well as the increase in net profit in the agricultural holding, was attributed to higher sales volumes and higher grain prices.
The agricultural holding Continental Farmers Group has resumed sowing operations after a forced pause caused by a significant cold snap, the company’s press service reports.
Continental reminded that it started the sowing campaign in the last days of March with sowing sugar beet and planting potatoes, and is currently sowing sunflower.
In total, in the new season, Continental will grow spring crops on an area of almost 96 thou hectares, of which the largest share will be soybeans – 49.5 thou hectares, 26 thou hectares for corn, 15.7 thou hectares for sunflower, 2.5 thou hectares for sugar beet, and 2.1 thou hectares for potatoes.
“Favorable weather conditions and soil preparation, which started as planned in mid-March, helped us to start sowing spring crops early. However, further precipitation slowed down the pace of work, and significant temperature drops in the first half of April even suspended it,” the company said.
Continental expects the peak load of field work in the second half of April, when corn and soybean sowing begins. The company expects to complete the sowing campaign in the second decade of May if the weather does not make any significant adjustments.
Mriya Agro Holding and CFG, united under the name Continental Farmers Group, have been operating as a single business since November 2018, when Mriya entered into an agreement with international investor Salic UK to sell its assets.
Salic was founded in 2012. Its sole shareholder is the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund, which invests in agricultural and livestock production.
“Continental Farmers Group is an agricultural company that cultivates 195 thousand hectares of land in 5 regions of Western Ukraine: Ternopil, Lviv, Khmelnytsky, Chernivtsi, and Ivano-Frankivsk regions. The company specializes in crop production: it grows grains, oilseeds and industrial crops and is one of the largest potato producers in Ukraine.
TAS Agro’s southern cluster (Kirovohrad, Vinnytsia and Mykolaiv regions) has started the spring sowing campaign, with a focus on sunflower, which will be planted on 2764 hectares, the company’s press service reported on Facebook.
“The production units are fully provided with seeds, fertilizers, plant protection products, and fuel and lubricants. Modern technological complexes are used in sowing, which increase the accuracy of sowing and increase productivity,” said Andriy Zvarych, director of TAS Agro South LLC.
Meanwhile, preparations for the sowing season are underway in the central, northern and western clusters of TAS Agro. In particular, TAS Agro’s northern cluster in Chernihiv region is currently preparing machinery for the upcoming spring field work. TAS Agro West is completing the pre-sowing soil preparation stage, which involves closing off moisture on an area of 13.5 thousand hectares.
In addition, TAS Agro Center continues to provide comprehensive crop care and conducts regular fertilization of winter wheat using UAN-32 mixed with ammonium thiosulfate.
TAS Agro was established in 2014. Its land bank includes 88 thousand hectares in Chernihiv, Sumy, Kyiv, Vinnytsia, Kirovohrad and Mykolaiv regions. The holding specializes in crop production, with elevators with a capacity of about 250 thousand tons. The livestock business is represented by a cattle herd of 5.5 thousand heads, of which 2.5 thousand heads are dairy cattle.
According to the Opendatabot resource, the company’s revenue in 2023 amounted to UAH 2.588 billion, net profit – UAH 155.842 million, debt – UAH 1.2 billion, assets were estimated at UAH 1.8653 billion, and the number of employees – 129. The authorized capital is UAH 8 thousand.
The agricultural holding is part of the TAS group, founded in 1998. Its business interests include the financial sector (banking and insurance segments) and pharmacy, as well as industry, real estate, and venture capital projects.
The founder of TAS and the beneficiary of the TAS Agro agricultural holding is Sergiy Tigipko.
As of March 13, Ukraine sowed 83 thousand hectares of spring grains and legumes in 15 regions, the press service of the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food reported.
According to the report, a week ago, the work was carried out in two southern regions – Mykolaiv and Odesa. Now they have been joined by 13 more regions.
Currently, barley has been sown on 45.2 thousand hectares, peas – on 17.8 thousand hectares, spring wheat – on 12.9 thousand hectares, oats – on 7.2 thousand hectares.
Ternopil – 15.2 thousand hectares, Volyn – 11 thousand hectares, Rivne – 10.84 thousand hectares, Vinnytsia – 10.1 thousand hectares and Mykolaiv – 10 thousand hectares are the leaders in sowing spring crops.
The Ministry of Agrarian Policy reminded that in 2025 Ukraine plans to plant more than 5.7 mln ha of spring grains and legumes, which corresponds to the level of 2024. The new season is characterized by the increase in the area under spring wheat by 28% (to 222.8 thou hectares), which is due to the growing demand from processors and exporters.
As reported, in 2024 the sowing campaign started on February 29. As of March 14, the sowing campaign was conducted in 14 regions of Ukraine, where 128.1 thou hectares of grains and pulses were planted, including 12.9 thou hectares of wheat, 69.6 thou hectares of barley, 41.5 thou hectares of peas and 3.7 thou hectares of oats.
Nibulon JV LLC, one of the largest grain market operators in Ukraine, has completed the sowing campaign of winter crops on 16.1 thou hectares, the grain trader’s press service reported on its Facebook page.
According to the report, Nibulon planted 8.6 thou hectares of winter wheat and 7.5 thou hectares of winter rapeseed. These crops are mainly concentrated in Mykolaiv region. According to the development strategy for the agricultural sector in 2024, the area under rapeseed has almost tripled, while winter wheat has decreased by 20% compared to the previous year.
The expansion of rapeseed acreage is due to the high profitability of this crop, which makes it economically attractive even in a changing climate, the agricultural holding explained.
Nibulon noted that in the 2024 season, the agricultural division of the agricultural holding had to take into account unfavorable weather conditions and adjust its work: for the second year in a row, sowing was carried out in dry soil, and the seeds were “preserved” in anticipation of favorable weather.
“In such circumstances, there are risks of provocative precipitation that causes seed germination but is insufficient for plant development and can lead to its death. Thus, we lost and had to reseed part of the rapeseed. But despite these circumstances, the vast majority of seedlings survived, developed and are going into winter in a satisfactory and good condition,” said Oleg Veselov, Director of Agricultural Production at the agricultural holding.
According to him, the situation was resolved by the company’s water-saving tillage technologies, which improved the quality and economy of crops even in conditions of drought and limited access to moisture.
Nibulon JV LLC was established in 1991. Prior to the Russian military invasion, the grain trader had 27 transshipment terminals and crop reception complexes, capacity for simultaneous storage of 2.25 million tons of agricultural products, a fleet of 83 vessels (including 23 tugs), and owned the Mykolaiv Shipyard.
“Before the war, Nibulon cultivated 82 thousand hectares of land in 12 regions of Ukraine and exported agricultural products to more than 70 countries. In 2021, the grain trader exported the highest ever volume of 5.64 million tons of agricultural products, reaching record volumes of supplies to foreign markets in August – 0.7 million tons, in the fourth quarter – 1.88 million tons, and in the second half of the year – 3.71 million tons.
Nibulon’s losses due to Russia’s full-scale military invasion in 2022 exceeded $416 million.
Currently, the grain trader is operating at 32% of capacity, has created a special unit to clear agricultural land of mines, and was forced to move its headquarters from Mykolaiv to Kyiv.
