Page 64 - UKRRptJun19

year’s harvest of 20mn tons.
Pig Progress news site reports that Danish and German companies are planning to launch pig farms in Ukraine, despite outbreaks of African swine flu. The site’s ‘World of Pigs’ feature reports that Danish company Agro East is building a farm in Zhytomyr with a capacity for 25,000 pigs. In Lviv region, two farms, for a total of 10,000 pigs, are planned by German pig producers Poels Mastschweine and Tierproduktion Alkersleben. In Ivano-Frankivsk region, Goodvalley Ukraine, another Danish company, plans to invest €4mn to build a meat processing plant.
Two new cases of African swine fever – one in Ternopil and one in Chernivtsi – were reported at the end of April by the State Service for Food Safety and Consumer Protection. Since 2015, about 400 outbreaks involving dozens of farm have been reported. Last year, 145 cases reported in Ukraine of the virus which is fatal to pigs. If infections continue to spread, Ukraine will lose 1.2mn pigs, or $150mn, by 2020, predicts the Food Safety agency.
Sunflower oil production was up by 14%, to 1.5mn tons, during the first quarter, compared to last year’s in January-March period. In March alone, sunflower oil production jumped to 23% y/y, to 527,000 tons, reports that State Statistics Service. Ukraine is the world’s largest exporter, with India the top buyer of the cooking oil. In 2018, production dropped by 8% y/y, to 4.8mn tons.
With two months left in the grain marketing year, farmers have exported 41mn tons – topping the 40mn tons exported during all of the previous marketing year. Ukraine has exported: 23mn tons of corn, 14mn tons of wheat, and 3.3mn tons of wheat. Underlining Ukraine’s role as a world food power, total grain exports could hit 50mn tons this year.
Favourable weather this winter and spring will allow Ukraine to increase its 2019 wheat harvest to 26.2mn tonnes and its barley harvest to 7.9 mn, the APK-Inform consultancy said on Wednesday. But the country is likely to cut its corn production to 33.1mn tonnes from a record 35.6mn tonnes in 2018, the consultancy said in a statement. Ukraine’s overall grain harvest may decrease slightly to 69.3mn tonnes this year from a record 69.8mn last year, it said.
64 UKRAINE Country Report June 2019 www.intellinews.com