The area sown under grain and oil crops will decrease in Ukraine

Analysts of the "Ukrainian Club of Agrarian Business" believe that the sown area under grain and oil crops will decrease in Ukraine this year. In the case of a pessimistic scenario, the area sown under grain and oil crops will decrease by 17%, to 16 million hectares. Grain areas will decrease by 17%, to 9.1 million hectares, and oil fields - by 16%, to 6.9 million hectares. Under the optimistic scenario, the sown area will decrease by 3%, to 18.6 million tons, and under grain it is planned to decrease by 3%, to 10.2 million hectares, and under oil crops - to increase by 1%, to 8.4 million hectares.

As analysts noted, crop production in Ukraine is unprofitable for the second year in a row. If in 2022 all types of grain and oil crops were unprofitable, then in 2023 part of oil crops became minimally profitable. Therefore, there are huge problems with the available finances for the purchase of all resources, in particular fuel.

In turn, the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food hopes that the sown area in Ukraine in the spring of 2024 will be at the same level as last year, although they do not rule out a certain reduction in the negative scenario. As the Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food, Mykola Solskyi, said in an interview with Reuters, he does not expect drastic changes in terms of sown areas. If the cultivated area decreases, it will be a very small decrease. He reminded that Ukrainian farmers sowed 12.75 million hectares of spring crops for the 2023 harvest. Of them, 4 million hectares of corn, 5.3 million hectares of sunflowers and 1.78 million hectares of soybeans. According to Solskyi, due to bad weather conditions last fall, less winter wheat was sown - 4.2 million hectares against 4.4 million hectares in 2022.

Therefore, according to the government official, there will definitely not be an increase in the total acreage this year. He allows them to be reduced, and there are only three options for sowing - sunflower, soybean and corn. According to him, farmers will try to increase the area sown under soybeans, but the lack of high-quality seeds can become a serious obstacle. According to the Minister, relatively low prices for sunflower seeds and mandatory crop rotation will prevent the increase of the cultivated area under this crop. According to Solskyi, winter wheat has so far survived the winter without serious damage, but it is too early to talk about the quality of the future harvest. Lack of funds for farmers, caused by the war and difficulties with export, forced them to economize and use wheat seeds of lower quality.

It is extremely important for Ukraine to preserve its agricultural industry, the Minister emphasized. Before the full-scale invasion of Russia, Ukraine was the fourth largest supplier of grain in the world, and in terms of value, agricultural products accounted for half of all Ukrainian exports.

We will remind that according to the data of the National Academy of Agrarian Sciences of Ukraine, due to the war, Ukraine lost 19.3% of cultivated areas. In general, as of today, Ukrainian farmers do not use more than 5 million hectares of arable land.