Ukraine's corn harvest starts, but volume lags 88% behind 2019

Ukraine's corn harvest has officially started with the country's agriculture reporting the first 107,000 mt of this year's production has been harvested, according to official ministry data.

Despite this year's harvest starting at much the same time as 2019's harvest, the production volume brought in is around 88% behind last year's, in another sign of the drought damage this year's crop has sustained.  

The volume was harvested from 25,800 ha, less than 1% of the planned area of 5.4 million ha and compares with the 921,000 mt that had been harvested from the fields by September 13, 2019.

The industry has been eagerly awaiting the start of the corn harvest in Ukraine, as forecasts regarding the production outlook are mixed amid uncertainity stemming from the impact of dry and hot weather.

Meanwhile, the sunflower harvest also progressed by 12 percentage points on the week and 19% of the planted area, equivalent to 1.2 million ha, has been completed with 1.98 million mt in the bins.

The volume is also down by 56% compared to last year.

Finally, the soybean crop harvest moved up 7 percentage points to 9%, meaning 217,900 mt has been harvested from 123,700 ha, which is also 73.5% down year-on-year.