IMC agricultural holding has completed the spring sowing campaign on 104,100 ha compared with 105,200 ha in 2018.
According to a company press release, the sowing area under sunflower this year amounted to 22,800 hectares, under soybean – 10,800 hectares, under corn – 69,500 hectares. Also about 1,000 hectares were planted with fodder crops to meet the needs of the company’s dairy farming.
“In the current season, we managed to sow crops in almost optimal time period, despite the fact that sowing took place with certain pauses caused by weather conditions,” Chief Operating Officer of the IMC Oleksandr Verzhykhovskyi said.
IMC’s core business is cultivation of grains, oilseeds and milk production in Ukraine. The agricultural holding cultivates about 130,000 hectares of land in Poltava, Chernihiv, and Sumy regions. It owns storage facilities with a capacity of 554,000 tonnes of grains and oilseeds.
Ukraine has started sowing soybeans, planting 31,000 hectares (2% of the forecast) with this crop, the press service of the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food has reported.
According to the ministry, as of April 17 some 1.5 million hectares are sown with barley (94%), 150,000 hectares with wheat (90%), 165,000 hectares with oats (84%), and 283,000 hectares with peas (83%).
Ukraine has also sowed 264,000 hectares with corn (6%), 194,000 hectares with sugar beets (79%), and one million hectares with sunflower (18%).
In addition, according to the ministry, agrarians fertilized winter crops on 7.5 million hectares (99% of the forecast).
As of March 7, 2019, Ukraine has started sowing early grain and leguminous crops in seven regions. The crops had been sowed on 58,000 ha or 3% of the target.
According to a report of the Agricultural Policy and Food Ministry of Ukraine, spring barley was sowed on 34,000 ha (2%), wheat on 1,000 ha (1%), peas on 23,000 ha (7%) and millet on 500 ha.
In addition, fertilizer input on areas with winter crops in grain was finished on 4.6 million ha (60% of the target).
Fertilizers were input on 3.8 million ha with winter wheat (59%), on 43,000 ha with winter rye (38%) and 718,000 ha with winter barley (71%).
In addition, areas with winter rapeseeds were filled with fertilizers on 1.1 million ha (83%).
The ministry said that the logistics of agricultural products remains a bottleneck of Ukrainian exports.
“Therefore, there is a proposal and a common desire of the response team members [the interdepartmental response team in agricultural logistics] to transfer its work to the systemic track. In parallel with the current and urgent issues, we will work on a long-term development strategy and logistics efficiency in agriculture, and jointly worked out decisions and proposals will be submitted to the meetings of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine,” Acting Minister of Agricultural Policy and Food Olha Trofimtseva said.
According to her, among the key issues requiring strategic discussion are three issues: the predictability of operation or closure of low-efficiency stations and the possibility of alternative solutions; fair and transparent pricing; systematic vision of the formation of routes of transportation of agricultural products in 2019.
Ukrainian agrarians as of November 5 had sowed 7 million hectares with winter grains with the projected area being 7.2 million hectares for the 2019 harvest.
According to a report on the website of the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food, 6 million hectares of the area were sown with winter wheat, with the forecast being 6.2 million hectares, 120,000 hectares with rye with the forecast standing at 150,000 hectare, and 870,000 hectares with winter barley with the forecast being 870,000 hectares.
In addition, one million hectares were sown with winter rapeseeds, with a forecast of 890,000 hectares.
“We are reaching the projected result of 7.2 million hectares under winter crops for grain. As of November 5, about 150,000 hectares more were sown than on the same date last year,” First Deputy Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food Maksym Martyniuk said on Facebook.
According to him, the work was carried out within the best terms, the level of soil moisture was sufficient both for sowing and to ensure the best conditions for growth and development.
“The availability of material and technical resources was at the level or above the need. The availability of mineral fertilizers for the autumn field work amounted to 776,000 tonnes or 108% of the application, in particular phosphate fertilizers amounted to 207,000 tonnes (109% of the need),” Martyniuk reported.
The sowing of spring crops has started in Kherson and Mykolaiv regions, First Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Food Policy Maksym Martyniuk said on his Facebook page. According to his data, as of April 2 Kherson region had sowed 4,000 hectares with barley and 300 hectares with peas. Mykolaiv region sowed barley on 600 hectares. The area under crops for the harvest of 2018 will be 27.2 million hectares, which corresponds to the indicator of 2017.
As of March 30, Ukrainian agrarians are 100% provided with seeds (638,000 tonnes), 91% with plant protection agents (27,400 tonnes), and 81% with fuel (326,000 tonnes). Martyniuk noted, despite the increase in import duties on fertilizers from Russia (from 36.03% to 42.96%), prices for most types of fertilizers (including ammonium nitrate) over the last week did not increase, but even slightly decreased.
