Page 106 - RusRPTJun19

Combined exports of agricultural products grew 20% to $25.9bn in 2018, almost twice as much as exports of arms and weapons. Separately Ukraine is also expecting another bumper harvest and may out export Russia as a result. Ukraine brought in 70mn tonnes of grain in the last marketing year and exported a total of 39.4mn tonnes. This year the Ukrainian Agricultural Ministry is expecting the harvest of be on a par with last year’s but are predicting the country could export as much as 50.4mn tonnes, which would make Ukraine the world’s biggest exporter. With a population size that is a third of Russia’s Ukraine can afford to export a much larger share of its harvest than Russia.
Russian agro major Miratorg become the largest agricultural landowner in the country with 1mn hectares, boosting its land bank 1.5-fold year-on- year in the past year, Vedomosti daily reported on May 15 citing the study by BEFL consulting company. Former leader Prodimeks and Agrocultura controlled by Igor Hudokormov came in second with 0.87mn ha (up by 9.5% y/y), and Rusagro of Vadim Moshkovich with 0.65mn ha. Miratorg, one of the country’s largest producers of pork and beef (0.42mn and 0.1mn tonnes annually, respectively, became the first agricultural company to consolidate over 1mn ha in its land bank, although previously the company did not disclose this data. Analysts surveyed by Vedomosti note that 1mn ha of fields, pastures, and farmland is a sizable territory even on a global scale. Largest global agro majors control about 4mn-5mn ha, such as Australian Macquarie Group or MacLachlan Family. Another notable growth in the land bank was showed by Ekoniva mil major, which boosted its land bank 1.5-fold to 0.5mn ha. BEFL expects 2019 to see more land acquisition deals, such as acquisition of Sun Products oil producer by Rusagro (0.16mn ha) and of Lipetsk-based agro company Trio (0.1mn ha) by French Sucden. Total agricultural lands in Russia as of January 1 2018 is estimated at 383mn hectares, out of which 51.6% are farmlands.
106 RUSSIA Country Report June 2019 www.intellinews.com