Ukraine harvests nearly 64 mln tonnes of key crops, including 1.5 mln tonnes over past week - Agriculture Policy and Food Ministry

MOSCOW. Nov 25 (Interfax) - Ukrainian farmers harvested 63.81 million tonnes of key crops from 16.03 million hectares as of November 25, including 1.5 million tonnes from 0.1 million hectares between November 18 and 25, Ukrainian media reported referring to the Agrarian Policy and Food Ministry website on Friday.

The total area from which crops have been harvested over the past week has increased by one percentage point to reach 82% of the projected area, it said, it said.

In the breakdown of particular crops, the harvesting of wheat, barley, peas, and rapeseed has been completed. Last week saw no change in the amount of millet that has been harvested from 95% of farmland, buckwheat from 98%, sunflower from 96%, and soybeans from 97%, while the amount of harvested sugar beet grew to 93% (+3 pp), and corn to 53% (+3 pp).

The final wheat harvest this year amounted to 19.4 million tonnes reaped from 4.7 million hectares, barley 5.6 million tonnes from 1.6 million hectares, rapeseed 3.2 million tonnes from 1.1 million hectares, and peas 261,000 tonnes from 111,000 hectares, the ministry said.

As of November 25, farmers also gathered 13.5 million tonnes of corn (+1.2 million tonnes over the past week) from 2.2 million hectares (+0.1 million hectares) 9.8 million tonnes of sunflower from 4.5 million hectares (no change), 8.2 million tonnes of sugar beet (+0.3 million tonnes) from 166,000 hectares (+4,000 hectares), 3.6 million tonnes of soybeans from 1.5 million hectares (no change), 156,000 tonnes of buckwheat from 115,000 hectares (no change), and 98,000 tonnes of millet from 42,600 hectares (no change).

The average yield for all crops this year was 4.37 tonnes per hectare, including 6.01 tonnes per hectare for corn, 4.12 tonners per hectare for wheat, 3.51 tonnes per hectare for barley, 2.89 tonnes per hectare for rapeseed, 2.4 tonnes per hectare for soybeans, 2.34 tonnes per hectare for peas, 2.31 tonnes per hectare for millet, 2.17 tonnes per hectare for sunflower, 1.37 tonnes per hectare for buckwheat, and 49.5 tonnes per hectare for sugar beet.

The GrainTrade reported adverse weather conditions in Ukraine earlier this week, which increases the likelihood that the unharvested corn might remain in the fields through the winter. This would reduce the supply of new corn on the market, make deliveries to ports unstable, and push purchasing prices for it up on the domestic market.

Ukrainian analysts earlier estimated the final corn harvest in Ukraine at 27 million to 28 million tonnes, and the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) at 31.5 million tonnes, while only 13.5 million tonnes of corn has been actually harvested thus far.

As reported earlier, Ukraine yielded a record harvest of grains, legumes and oilseeds totaling 106 million tonnes in 2021, including 84 million tonnes of grains and legumes and 22.6 million tonnes of oilseeds.

In particular, Ukraine last year harvested 32.4 million tonnes of wheat, 40 million tonnes of corn, 10 million tonnes of barley, 581,500 tonnes of peas, 191,000 tonnes of millet, 110,000 tonnes of buckwheat, as well as 16.3 million tonnes of sunflower, 3.4 million tonnes of soybeans, and 2.9 million tonnes of rapeseed.