Agriculture Ministry reduces forecast of agricultural production growth rate in 2015 to 1.4%
MOSCOW. April 15 (Interfax) - The Russian Agriculture Ministry is expecting that the growth of agricultural production this year will amount to 1.4% instead of the 2.7% envisaged by the state program for the development of agriculture, Russian Agriculture Minister Nikolai Fyodorov said at a ministry meeting on Wednesday in Moscow.
He said that the adjustment of the growth of agricultural production is connected mainly with the remaining risks due to the still unstable macroeconomic situation.
Speaking about the results of 2014, the minister said that the growth of agricultural production was 3.7%. In addition, a high grain harvest was achieved, 105.3 million tonnes and "we managed to break the almost historic tradition of a fall in the production of milk."
He said that the amount of imports of agricultural commodities and food in 2014 fell by $4.1 billion to $40.9 billion. And exports were record-breaking at $19.136 billion, which is 15% more than in 2013.
The minister said that this year farmers must more actively use new forms of sector support, including project financing. He said that of the seven projects that were selected for participation in the program for project financing, five are in the agricultural sector. Their total sum amounts to 28 billion rubles.
"This demonstrates that agricultural investors in Russia are better prepared for work with new instruments. The line of agricultural producers for this program is much larger than those from other sectors," he said.