Ukrainian farmers harvest 30.42 mln tonnes of grain from 63% of fields, yield 11.3% below last year

 As of September 26, Ukrainian farmers had harvested 30.423 million tonnes of early grain and leguminous crops from 7.214 million hectares, or 63% of the sown area, the Ministry of Economy, Environment and Agriculture reported.

On the same date last year, farmers had collected 34.3 million tonnes from 13.6 million hectares – 11.3% and 46.9% higher, respectively – mainly due to an earlier start to the corn harvest.

This year, 964,200 tonnes of corn have been harvested from 195,900 hectares, compared with about 4.7 million tonnes from 920,700 hectares by this time last year.

Wheat yields are slightly higher than last year at 22.53 million tonnes from 5.02 million hectares versus 22.30 million tonnes from 4.9 million hectares. Barley harvests are marginally lower at 5.5 million tonnes from 1.4 million hectares compared with 5.50 million tonnes from 1.41 million hectares a year ago.

The pea harvest is significantly larger – 626,600 tonnes from 266,000 hectares versus 465,300 tonnes from 212,200 hectares last year. By contrast, buckwheat and millet yields are sharply lower at 66,900 tonnes versus 115,500 tonnes and 50,500 tonnes versus 147,800 tonnes, respectively. Other grains and legumes reached 859,400 tonnes from 308,700 hectares as of September 26.

Among the leading regions: Odesa region harvested 3.69 million tonnes from 1.1 million hectares; Vinnytsia, 2.42 million tonnes from 436,000 hectares; Kirovohrad, 2.22 million tonnes from 541,300 hectares; and Khmelnytsky, 2.13 million tonnes from 309,600 hectares.

For oilseeds, the rapeseed harvest was only slightly below last year's – 3.30 million tonnes versus 3.5 million tonnes – on an equal sown area of 1.3 million hectares.

Soybean and sunflower harvests, still underway, are lagging significantly: soybeans totaled 1.5 million tonnes from 749,700 hectares compared with 3.5 million tonnes from 1.6 million hectares a year ago, while sunflower yields reached 4.11 million tonnes from 2.24 million hectares versus 6.6 million tonnes from 3.3 million hectares.

Sugar beet harvesting is also behind: 1.419 million tonnes from 29,000 hectares, compared with 2.5 million tonnes by this date last year.