Ukrainian farmers should not engage in dumping on international markets but instead aim to win global competition by showcasing the quality of Ukrainian agricultural products. This approach will enable Ukraine to achieve economic victory over the aggressor nation, stated Oksana Osymachko, the Deputy Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food.
"The aggressor nation is currently a serious competitor for us in external agricultural markets. However, let's take a more pragmatic view. Three years of war have taught us to adapt. And it is precisely because of this that we will try to gain an economic advantage," she said at the Grain Storage Forum in Kyiv on Friday.
Oksana Osymachko provided an example regarding Egypt's grain purchases in the 2024/2025 season.
According to her information, in October 2024, the grain association of the Russian Federation announced its entry into the global market with an open communiqué, stating its refusal to work with intermediaries and that it would sign direct contracts with 11 African countries. This allowed Russia to engage in dumping and secure a billion-dollar contract. Subsequently, the aggressor nation supplied grain of extremely low quality under this contract to Egypt. Egypt is storing the purchased products in elevators. According to Egyptian law, a certain quantity of grain must be held in the state reserve to ensure the food security of its citizens. Egypt expressed dissatisfaction with the supplier. The state now finds itself in a difficult situation, needing to clear the elevators of spoiled products and ensure its population is supplied with food.
Osymachko reported that Ukraine's Minister of Agrarian Policy, Vitaliy Koval, is flying to Egypt on an official visit on Friday. His goal is to negotiate the timeline for Egypt's payments for the delivered grain, which currently stands at 270 days. She noted that Ukrainian farmers cannot afford not only extremely low, dumping prices for grain but also have their own rules, which require them to report to the government on the repatriation of foreign currency earnings.
"We are currently in negotiations with the Egyptian side. Our minister is traveling to Egypt today with a delegation to leverage this political moment, where they have tried a batch and now don't know what to do with it, and money needs to be paid. (...) Therefore, I urge our grain producers that we must present a united front and stick to our position. Everything is temporary (...) But such cases will continue to emerge," the deputy minister emphasized.
Osymachko reminded that Ukraine signed a memorandum with Lithuania and the United Kingdom on the Grain Verification Scheme (GVS) during the conference of agricultural ministers in Berlin in January 2025. This memorandum aims to track the export of Russian grain from occupied Ukrainian territories. According to the agreements, Lithuania will verify the shipment of grain cargoes coming from Russian territories at the ports of Klaipeda. Ukraine has already provided the Lithuanian side with samples of Ukrainian grain that were previously grown in the occupied territories for further comparison with Russian grain cargoes. All instances of grain trade from Ukrainian lands will be documented as precedents.
"We are actively working to have other countries join this memorandum. It is challenging, but we are on it. We must understand that time will gradually set everything in its rightful place," Osymachko concluded, urging everyone to work actively and fight for global markets with the quality of products produced in Ukraine.