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bne September 2017 Eastern Europe I 45
ning of August was 44.6 centners per hectare, 15.9% up on last year. Most notably, the yield of wheat was 13% higher than last year at 46.6 c/ha. In the Krasnodar Territory, 62 centners were threshed from a hectare vs 58.5 centners a year ago, according to Ros- stat. According to the Federal State Statistics Service, by the beginning
of August, 28.6mn tons of grain were harvested, which is 15.9% less than at the beginning of August 2016.
Ukraine is in the same position. Ukraine's grain harvest for the 2017/18 marketing year will be 60.2-63.0mn tonnes, a decline of 4.5-8.8% y/y from the bumper 66mn tonnes it brought in last year, but also above the five-year average.
Belarus’ is on course for a good yield this year, with half the harvest in. Half of all the area under cultivation has produced 7mn tonnes of grain by the end of August, and the government is forecasting a total harvest of 10mn tonnes.
Bad weather in May delayed the start of the harvest by up to three weeks across the region so farmers are still playing catch- up with last year’s results.
The USDA predicts that total wheat production this year will be 743mn tonnes, or which the 12 countries of the Former Soviet Union (FSU) account for 134mn. Collectively the FSU countries have increased their forecast for production by 8.6mn tonnes.
Russia in particular beat last year’s wheat production record by 5mn to produce a total of 77mn tonnes in the early harvest season, which accounts for three quarters of its entire grain production. In both Russia and Ukraine winter wheat harvests are in and ahead of target.
Find more Eastern Europe content at www.bne.eu/eastern-europe
Selected headlines from past month:
· Russian court lands €2bn blow on Sistema
· Kerch bridge to hurt Ukraine’s trade
· Residents at Belarus-China industrial park Great Stone to invest $700m
into new projects
www.bne.eu