Agroindustrial holding Astarta, the largest sugar producer in Ukraine, has completed its 2022 sugar season, which lasted from September to January, with a total of about 2 million tons of sugar beet processed into 282 thousand tons of sugar.
According to the company’s website on Wednesday, the past sugar season was the most difficult in the holding company’s history, although the volume of sugar produced increased by 6% over the 2021 season, and by 25% over the 2020 season.
It is specified that Astarta’s sugar yield from the raw materials last season was 14.26%, while the Ukrainian average was 13.98%, and 99% of the produced sugar corresponds to the highest quality category.
The holding referred to the preliminary data of Ukrtsukor association, according to which Astarta’s share on the Ukrainian sugar production market in 2022 season was 25%.
The sugar producer specified that its planted areas under sugar beet in central and western regions of Ukraine were not significantly affected by military operations, but it faced a number of other challenges.
“Due to increased costs for fertilizers, crop protection products and fuel, sugar beet cultivation costs per hectare have risen. Nearly continuous rains during the harvest period have made both harvesting the crop and transporting it from the fields to processing plants much more difficult. However, Astarta harvested 1.8 million tons of sugar beets in 2022 at a yield of 56 tons/ha,” the holding quoted its director of agricultural products processing Yevgeny Sadovy as saying.
“Astarta stressed that it was able to implement a number of energy-saving projects at its sugar refineries during the war, in particular, a scheme for autonomous power supply to enterprises in case of a power blackout.
“Astarta is a vertically integrated agro-industrial holding operating in eight regions of Ukraine. It consists of six sugar factories, farms with a land bank of 220 thousand hectares and dairy farms with 22 thousand cattle, oil extraction plant in Globino (Poltava region), seven elevators and biogas complex.
Agricultural holding in 2021 increased net profit 14 times compared with 2020 – up to EUR 122.5 mln, EBITDA – 1.8 times, up to EUR 201.5 mln. Its revenue increased by 18.2% – to EUR 491.35 mln, one third of which (EUR 170 mln) was generated by sugar production and sales.
Agroindustrial holding “Astarta”, the largest sugar producer in Ukraine, plans to process up to 2 million tons of sugar beet, grown at the own enterprise and supplied by the third-party farmers in the current season.
To date, the sugar plants have already produced 241 thousand tons of white sugar from more than 1.7 million tons of beets, and plan to process more than 200 thousand tons more, the holding said in a statement on the Warsaw Stock Exchange.
“Astarta” in 2022 began the sugar season on September 16, a total of five sugar refineries of the group were working during the season.
As reported, on December, 9 sugar beet in Ukraine is harvested from 98% of the planned areas, totally 8.9 million tons (+0.3 million tons for the last week) from 177 thousand hectares (+3 thousand hectares).
“Astarta is a vertically integrated agro-industrial holding, which operates in eight regions of Ukraine. It consists of six sugar factories, agro-farms with land bank of 220 thousand hectares, dairy farms with 22 thousand cattle, oil extraction plant in Globino (Poltava region), seven elevators and biogas complex.
Agroholding increased its net profit in 2021 14 times compared to 2020 – up to EUR 122.5 mln, EBITDA – 1.8 times, up to EUR 201.5 mln. Its revenue increased by 18.2% up to EUR 491.35 mln, one third of which (EUR 170 mln) was generated by sugar production and sales.
Farmers dug 10.6 million tonnes of sugar beet in Ukraine in 2021, which is 2.3 million tonnes (28.7%) more than in 2020 (8.2 million tonnes), according to the Ukrtsukor association.
The average sugar beet yield in Ukraine was 46.9 tonnes per ha, which is 6 tonnes per ha more than in 2020 (40.9 tonnes per ha).
The highest yield is in Lviv region – 55.6 tonnes per ha. The following regions are leading in gross production: Vinnytsia region with 2.4 million tonnes, Khmelnytsky region with 1.5 million tonnes and Poltava region with 1.07 million tonnes.
Ukraine sowed some 209,000 hectares with sugar beet as of May 13, 2020, which is 5% less than in 2019, the National Association of Sugar Producers Ukrtsukor has said.
The association said in a statement on Friday that apart from a reduction in area under crops the season is also characterized by less favorable weather conditions, which, in turn, may significantly affect the crop yield.
“This year the sowing campaign was very complicated as snowless winter and the absence of precipitations caused a lack of moisture in soil. Hence, we have dust storms and dry wind. Then April drought changed with May rainfalls and freezing weather, while a part of crops was attacked by insects in Vinnytsia, Poltava and Khmelnytsky regions. All these factors may have a negative impact on growth of root crops, and as a result they will lose mass and sugar content,” Ukrtsukor analyst Nazar Mykhailovyn said.
Traditionally, the largest share of crops falls to Vinnytsia region – 23%, which is followed by Poltava region with 12.9% and Khmelnytsky region with 11.2%. Kyiv region ranked fourth with 10.8%.
As reported, sugar production in Ukraine in the 2019/2020 marketing year (MY, September-August) decreased by 19% compared to the previous MY, to 1.48 million tonnes. A total of 33 sugar refineries were operating during the season.
