Ukraine plans to double the export of grain by sea

MOSCOW, 29 Aug – PRIME. The Ukrainian authorities are considering the possibility of including new ports in the “grain corridor” to increase the volume of exports of agricultural products, said Minister of Infrastructure of Ukraine Oleksandr Kubrakov.

“The dynamics of applications that we are seeing is 10-15 ships per day. For example, yesterday seven ships called at our ports … We already have about 40 applications, about 700 thousand tons of agricultural products have already left the ports of Great Odessa since the start of the grain initiative “We want to expand it and add other ports,” Kubrakov is quoted as saying by the Ekonomicheskaya Pravda edition.

The minister noted that the success of exports largely depends on the private sector, which makes “bold deeds”, as, according to him, there are companies that buy “ship after ship”. At the same time, Kubrakov noted that not all international and not all Ukrainian companies are ready to take such a risk.

“One of the biggest priorities is for the corridor to be expanded for all the export-import that our state needs. The time will come when ships not only with agricultural products will go along this corridor,” Kubrakov said, answering a question about whether he plans to Ukraine to start exporting steel products.

According to the Ministry of Infrastructure of Ukraine, as of August 28, 54 ships with Ukrainian agricultural products left the ports of Odessa, Chornomorsk and Yuzhny as part of the “grain agreement”. During this period, about a million tons of Ukrainian food was exported, that is, as much as it was possible to export by road since March of this year.

In Istanbul on July 22, multilateral agreements were signed on lifting restrictions on the supply of Russian products for export and on Russia’s assistance in the export of Ukrainian grain. The deal, which was signed by representatives of Russia, Turkey, Ukraine and the UN, involves the export of Ukrainian grain, food and fertilizer across the Black Sea from three ports, including Odessa.