Ukraine has started the sowing season for the 2024 harvest, but the forecasts are not encouraging.

Traditionally, in the second half of August the sowing campaign for the following year’s winter crops begins in the southern regions of Ukraine. However, forecasts regarding the season’s results are quite pessimistic. In 2022, the winter grain crop area amounted to 4.5 million hectares. In 2021, the last full season before the full-scale invasion, the planted area for winter crops exceeded 6.5 million hectares.

It is noted that, according to forecasts, the planted area will decrease even more this year by 1–1.5 million hectares. The main reasons for the reduction in production volumes: a shortage of working capital among agricultural producers, occupation of territories and mining, the collapse of export logistics after the suspension of the grain corridor, and low purchase prices due to the high logistics cost. As a result, five to six million tons of wheat and barley will be produced, or almost a third of the current year’s results.