Ukrainian farmers have completed the wheat harvest, yielding 26.26 million metric tons of grain from an area of 5.12 million hectares, which is 15.3% higher than the 2025 harvest, the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine reported on November 3.
The average wheat yield in 2026 was 51.3 centners per hectare, compared to 45.1 centners per hectare last year, an increase of 13.7%.
At the same time, the area harvested for wheat increased by only 1.4%, or approximately 70,700 hectares. Thus, the main factor behind the increase in gross production was higher yields.
Barley also showed positive growth. Its gross harvest reached 6.60 million metric tons from an area of 1.48 million hectares, which is approximately 22.8% more than the figure at the end of October last year.
The average barley yield increased from 39.7 to 44.5 centners per hectare. At the same time, the area under cultivation expanded by approximately 9.8%.
The pea harvest has also been completed. According to the ministry, 834,100 metric tons were harvested from 302,200 hectares, with an average yield of 27.6 centners per hectare.
Compared to 2025, the gross harvest of peas increased by 26.2%, and the yield increased by approximately 13%.
In total, the harvest of the three main early grain and legume crops—wheat, barley, and peas—amounted to about 33.69 million metric tons.
The increase in yields for these crops is important for securing the domestic food market, supporting the flour milling and animal feed industries, and building Ukraine’s export reserves.
At the same time, wheat remains Ukraine’s largest grain crop in terms of gross volume already harvested in 2026, although the ongoing corn harvest may alter the ratio between crops.
Sources: Ministry of Agrarian Policy, data as of November 3, 2026; official statistics on the 2025 harvest.
According to Experts.news, as of November 4, 2026, Ukrainian farmers had planted 4.448 million hectares with winter grain crops, which is 400,300 hectares, or 8.3%, less than on the same date last year, the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine reported.
According to the ministry, 85.4% of the projected area for winter grain crops—totaling approximately 5.21 million hectares—has been planted.
The largest declines were seen in winter wheat and barley plantings. Specifically, 3.953 million hectares—or 87.1% of the forecast—have been sown with wheat and triticale. This is 350.5 thousand hectares, or 8.1%, less than on the same date in 2025.
Winter barley has been planted on 420,500 hectares, which is only 70.8% of the projected area. Compared to last year, its planted area has decreased by 58,200 hectares, or 12.1%.
At the same time, the area planted with winter rye increased by 12.7%, to 74.3 thousand hectares. Farmers have already completed 96.9% of the forecast for this crop.
The pace of grain planting has slowed in recent weeks. During the week of October 28 through November 4, the planted area increased by 234,600 hectares, whereas the previous week saw an increase of 285,300 hectares, and the week before that—536,800 hectares.
Thus, the weekly increase in grain plantings decreased by 17.8%, and compared to the figure from two weeks ago, it has more than halved.
In total, farmers still need to plant about 763,000 hectares of winter grains to meet the forecast, including approximately 588,000 hectares of wheat and triticale and 173,000 hectares of barley.
As of the same date in 2025, Ukrainian farmers had planted 4.848 million hectares of winter grains. At that time, wheat plantings totaled 4.304 million hectares, barley—478,700 hectares, and rye—65,900 hectares.
The current figures reflect the progress of the fall planting campaign for the 2027 harvest. The final area planted with winter grains will depend on the completion of fieldwork, and the future harvest will also depend on how well the crops survive the winter and on spring weather conditions.
Sources: Ministry of Agrarian Policy, operational data on winter crop planting as of November 4, 2026; official planting statistics as of November 4, 2025.
As of October 27, 2026, Ukrainian farmers had harvested 41.7 million metric tons of grains and legumes from an area of 8.32 million hectares, or 72% of the projected planted area. The average yield reached 50.2 centners per hectare, compared to 45.8 centners per hectare last year, according to the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine.
Thus, the grain yield increased by approximately 9.6%, which helped offset delays in the harvesting of certain late-maturing crops.
For comparison: as of October 31, 2025, farmers had harvested 40.20 million metric tons of grain from 8.77 million hectares, or 76% of the total area. When comparing these figures, the difference in reporting dates must be taken into account.
According to the ministry’s data, the harvest of wheat, barley, and peas has been fully completed in Ukraine.
The gross wheat harvest totaled 26.24 million metric tons from an area of 5.12 million hectares, which is 15.2% higher than last year’s figure of 22.78 million metric tons. The average yield increased from 45.1 to 51.2 centners per hectare, or by 13.6%.
The barley harvest grew by 23.2%—from 5.36 million to 6.60 million metric tons. At the same time, the harvested area increased by 9.8%—to 1.48 million hectares, and the yield rose from 39.7 to 44.5 centners per hectare.
An even more significant increase was recorded for peas. Pea production reached 833,600 metric tons, compared to 660,700 metric tons last year, an increase of 26.2%.
The area planted with peas grew by 11.4%, to 302,200 hectares, and the average yield was 27.6 centners per hectare, compared to 24.4 centners per hectare a year earlier.
Thus, the growth in production of the three main early-season grain and legume crops was driven by both higher yields and an expansion of the planted areas for certain crops.
At the same time, the corn harvest remains at a relatively early stage. As of October 27, farmers had threshed only 29% of the projected area, harvesting 7.89 million metric tons of this crop.
The future trend of the total grain harvest in 2026 will largely depend on the results of the corn harvest, which remains one of Ukraine’s main export crops.
Ukraine ranks among the world’s major producers and exporters of grain crops. Wheat and corn account for a significant portion of the country’s agricultural exports, while barley and peas are supplied to both the domestic market and foreign buyers.
Source: Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine, harvest data as of October 27, 2026.
Astarta, Ukraine’s largest sugar producer, saw revenue from sales of its key products decline by 28.6% in July–September 2026 compared to the same period in 2025: growth in sales of sugar, soybean oil and meal, and corn was not enough to offset the decline in sales of wheat, rapeseed, and milk.
According to data released by the holding company on the Warsaw Stock Exchange on Thursday evening, the company sold a total of 3.78 billion UAH worth of its main products in the third quarter of 2026, compared to 5.29 billion UAH in the third quarter of 2025.
Specifically, sugar sales in July–September increased by 13.8% in volume terms compared to the same period a year ago—reaching 71.51 thousand metric tons—while the average selling price remained virtually unchanged at 22.23 thousand UAH (per metric ton, here and below).
At the same time, Astarta’s wheat sales volume in the third quarter fell 21-fold—to 9,420 metric tons—and the average price dropped by 16.9%, to 8,211 UAH.
Corn sales, on the other hand, increased 13.9-fold, but to significantly lower volumes—9.67 thousand metric tons—while the price remained at 9.36 thousand UAH.
In addition, Astarta reduced its sales of sunflower seeds in July–September by 30.7%—to 1.72 thousand metric tons—although the selling price rose by 17.8%—to 27.40 thousand UAH.
Sales of rapeseed fell by 34.4% to 7.18 thousand metric tons, but the price rose by 27.4% to 29.03 thousand UAH.
Sales of soybean oil in the third quarter rose by 11.8% to 12,570 metric tons, with the price increasing by 17.1% to 54,910 UAH, while sales of soybean meal fell by 20.2% to 27,700 metric tons, with the price rising by 32.5% to 20,380 UAH.
The agricultural holding’s milk sales in July–September 2026 rose by 3.7% to 30,720 metric tons, but the price of this product fell by 12% to 16,750 UAH.
Overall, in the first nine months of 2026, Astarta increased sales of its core products by 2.3%—to 14.7337 billion UAH—thanks to higher sales of sugar, corn, sunflower seeds, soybean oil, and meal, which offset the decline in sales of wheat and milk.
In particular, sugar sales increased by 17.2%—to 248,82 thousand metric tons—while the average selling price fell by 11.3%—to 20.51 thousand UAH.
Astarta’s stock price fell by 3.57% on Friday from the opening bell to PLN 29.7 per share.
Astarta is a vertically integrated agro-industrial holding company operating in eight regions of Ukraine. It comprises six sugar refineries, agricultural enterprises with a land bank of 220,000 hectares, dairy farms with 22,000 head of cattle, an oil extraction plant in Hlobine (Poltava Oblast), seven grain elevators, and a biogas complex.
In the first half of 2026, the Astarta agricultural holding reported a net loss of EUR14.07 million, compared to a net profit of EUR42.27 million for the same period last year. Consolidated revenue for the first half of this year decreased by only 0.1% to EUR226.47 million, with export sales accounting for 62% compared to 61% in the first half of last year.
A prolonged blockade of the Black Sea could lead to a significant reduction in grain plantings during the 2026/27 marketing year (MY), primarily corn and wheat, farmers may partially shift to oilseeds, which are more profitable under these conditions, said Taras Vysotsky, Ukraine’s Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food.
“Our assessment is that the area planted with grains—primarily corn and wheat—will decrease, while the area planted with oilseeds—primarily soybeans and sunflowers—will increase,” he told reporters in Kyiv on Thursday, according to an Interfax-Ukraine correspondent.
“The largest reduction in acreage—as it looks today—will be for corn: we do not rule out that this reduction could even be by half,” the minister added.
Regarding wheat, he noted that a survey of farmers showed that the potential reduction in wheat acreage is 15–17%.
“From our perspective, this will reflect reality. If we had 5.1 million hectares of planted area in the 2025/26 marketing year—which included both winter and spring crops, with winter crops accounting for 5 million hectares—then we estimate that planted area in the 2026/27 marketing year will be 4–4.2 million hectares, a 17% decrease,” Vysotsky noted.
According to him, the area planted with barley will be 1.5 million hectares, and that planted with rapeseed will be 1.3 million hectares, of which 0.2 million hectares will be spring crops, which corresponds to the previous year’s figures.
The minister noted that, on average, 20 million hectares in Ukraine are planted with the six main grain and oilseed crops (wheat, barley, corn, sunflower, rapeseed, and soybeans).
According to data from the Ministry of Agrarian Policy, as of October 20, farmers had planted 3.93 million hectares with winter grain crops, or 75.4% of the projected area; over the past week, the planted area increased by 0.56 million hectares, whereas on the same date last year, the figure was 4.84 million hectares, or 74% of the forecast.
This year, 3.51 million hectares have already been planted with wheat (77.4% of the projected area), 0.34 million hectares with winter barley (57.9%), and 70,700 hectares with rye (92.1%). A year ago, these figures were 3.44 million hectares, 0.3 million hectares, and 60,000 hectares, respectively.
Winter rapeseed plantings in the 2026/27 marketing year exceeded the forecast: the area planted is 1.12 million hectares, or 101.4% of the planned volume, while last year 1.03 million hectares were planted.
The increase in yields was the main factor behind the rise in the gross harvest of major agricultural crops in Ukraine in 2026.
According to the Ministry of Agrarian Policy, the average yield of grains and legumes as of October 13 reached 49.1 centners per hectare, compared to 43.5 centners per hectare a year earlier.
The most notable positive trends among major crops were observed in sunflowers, wheat, rapeseed, and barley.
Sunflower yields rose by 17.7%—to 21.6 centners per hectare, compared to 18.4 centners per hectare a year earlier. While the harvested area decreased by 12.1%, the gross harvest still increased by 3.4%—to 7.44 million metric tons.
Wheat yields rose by 13.2% to 51.1 ts/ha, which led to a 14.8% increase in the gross harvest to 26.15 million metric tons.
As for rapeseed, the yield rose by 12.4%—to 29.2 centners per hectare—and the gross harvest increased by 17.1%, to 3.88 million metric tons.
Barley yielded an average of 44.3 centners per hectare, compared to 39.7 centners per hectare last year, meaning the yield increased by 11.8%. The gross harvest increased by 22.3% to 6.55 million metric tons.
Peas also showed positive trends: the yield increased by 12.3%, and the gross harvest by 25.1%.
The situation is different for soybeans and sugar beets. Soybean yields fell by 4.5% to 21.9 centners per hectare, while sugar beet yields also declined by approximately 4.5% to about 500 centners per hectare.
Thus, in 2026, the growth in gross yield for a number of key crops will be driven primarily not by an expansion of cultivated areas, but by increased production efficiency per hectare.
Source: Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine.
