Grain traders imported 1 million tons of Ukrainian wheat into Romania this season, making Romania the second-largest export market for Ukrainian wheat after Spain (3.3 million tons), Romanian business portal Economica.net reported, citing data from the Ukrainian customs authorities.
In the market year that started on July 1 last year, Ukrainian wheat exports fell by 4 percent compared to the previous season, to 10.3 million tons.
Among the destinations of wheat exports, Egypt (788,000 tons), Pakistan (696,000 tons) and Turkey (615,000 tons) follow behind Romania. Romania no longer appears in the data detailing Ukrainian wheat exports in February, with the main destinations being Pakistan, Egypt, Tunisia and Turkey.
The data, originally published on the London-based specialist portal AgriCenSus.com, put total Ukrainian grain exports for this trading season to mid-February at around 26.5 million tons, down 11 percent from the previous season. The largest volumes of maize exports were shipped to Spain (3.3 million tons), China (1.8 million tons), Italy (1.65 million tons), and the Netherlands (1.15 million tons).
Romania made imports of Ukrainian grain subject to authorization last autumn and since then, in principle, only domestic farmers and processors are allowed to import agricultural products from Ukraine.
The Bucharest agriculture ministry justified the measure at the time by saying that, although the EU’s “solidarity corridors” were supposed to be opened on the grounds of world food security, the temporary exemption from customs duties for Ukrainian agricultural products destined for other markets allowed traders to sell significant quantities in Romania. This caused serious market disruptions, depressed purchase prices for cereals and oilseeds, and made transport more expensive, leaving many Romanian farmers insolvent, the Romanian agriculture ministry pointed out.
Farmers in Romania protested for three weeks in January, holding demonstrations with tractors and blocking traffic. They were protesting, among other things, against the consequences of unrestricted Ukrainian grain exports coming into the country. Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu has repeatedly said that Romania only allows transit and that “not a single grain of Ukrainian wheat” has remained in the country since October.
