Ukraine faces a lack of herbicides, pesticides for spring sowing

KYIV (Reuters) -Ukrainian farmers, which have already started the 2023 spring sowing, have only around 35% of the herbicides and pesticides they need, analyst APK-Inform quoted on Monday official data as showed.

The Russian invasion has left Ukraine seriously short of finances, seeds and crop protection products, which could have a negative impact on crop yields this year.

APK-Inform said farmers had 9,356 tonnes of herbicides and pesticides, which is 34.7% of the declared 26,926 tonnes needed for the first half of this year.

The volume included 6,231 tonnes of herbicides, or about 36% of the volume needed.

The ministry said the most difficult situation is Kyiv and Lviv regions.

Denys Marchuk, deputy chair of the Ukrainian Agrarian Council said a lack of funds is the main problem for farmers this spring.

“Farmers will not be able to buy everything they need – seeds, fertilisers, fuel, crop protection products. Yields will be much lower and this will affect our export potential,” he told an online briefing.

“It is important to find money to lend to farmers,” Marchuk added.

The Council said last week that agricultural companies, which plant most of Ukraine’s fields, are 40 billion hryvnia ($1.08 billion) short of the funds they need to carry out spring work.

The ministry has not yet published its forecast for the 2023 grain harvest while the national academy of agricultural science said the harvest may fall 37% to 34 million tonnes.

The 2022 grain harvest fell to around 54 million tonnes from a record 86 million in 2021.

Output was hit by hostilities in Ukraine’s eastern, northern and southern regions following Russia’s invasion.

(Reporting by Pavel Polityuk; editing by Jason Neely)