On May 13, Hungary’s “state of danger” came to an end, and with it, a ban protecting Hungarian farmers against cheap Ukrainian grain. The previous government under Viktor Orbán had first imposed the state of danger due to Covid-19 and then extended it further when war broke out in Ukraine.
Both Fidesz and Mi Hazánk (“Our Homeland”) are now seeking to reimpose the lapsed ban on the importation of more than 20 products from Ukraine.
Mi Hazánk leader Toroczkai László says the ban was meant to protect Hungarian farmers, agriculture, and countryside, and the failure of the new government to reimpose it will destroy them.
“Péter Magyar’s government has quietly lifted the ban that prohibited the import of Ukrainian agricultural products into Hungary,” László wrote on X.
“From now on, cheap but often low-quality, unchecked Ukrainian grain, meat, eggs, flour, corn, sunflower seeds, rapeseed, etc., can flood into our country. This executes Hungarian farmers and rural Hungary, but clearly, this doesn’t interest the Tisza government,” the Mi Hazánk leader concluded.
Miközben a Facebookon zajlik az "abszolút filmszínház", a Meta-kormányzás, Magyar Péter kormánya szépen csendben feloldotta a tilalmat, amely az ukrán agrártermékek Magyarországra történő behozatalát tiltotta.
Mostantól ömölhet hazánkba az olcsó, de sokszor silány minőségű,… pic.twitter.com/YDfMNItb0F
— Toroczkai László (@ToroczkaiLaszlo) May 20, 2026Tibor Cseh, secretary general of the Association of Hungarian Farmers’ Associations and Farmers’ Cooperatives (Magosz), says that now traders are putting pressure on farmers to lower their prices, saying if they don’t, they will simply buy Ukrainian grain, wrote Világgazdaság.
Cseh told the portal that they will be contacting the relevant ministry to ask them to reimpose the ban. VG has also contacted the ministry about this, but had no response by the time of publication.
Although the EU has stepped in before to help farmers in Hungary and other member states recover from a horrible drought, there is no word if they will take a stand on the import of cheaper grain from Ukraine.
Meanwhile, the Fidesz faction in parliament says they submitted a bill yesterday that would prohibit the import of Ukrainian grain products.
“This has already caused trouble once; it has already caused a serious crisis in the Hungarian agricultural market when the European Union forced this on us. At that time, there was complete agreement in Hungary that this should not be allowed. High-quality Hungarian products must be protected,” said the head of the Fidesz faction, Gergéky Gulyás.
