The weather has an extremely negative impact on the formation of the yield of Ukrainian sunflower for the second season in a row. The crop yield will fall to the level of 2014, predicts oil market analyst Svitlana Kupriyeva for UkrAgroConsult, as reported by agronews.ua.
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She notes that the new forecast cancels out previous estimates. The increase in sunflower sowing area in the current marketing year, which runs from July 2025 to June 2026, initially allowed for an optimistic scenario and an expected increase in the harvest.
Sunflower exports for the first four months of the season amount to 12 thousand tons. This is the lowest level in the past two decades. However, there is nothing particularly bad about this, as almost the entire harvest is processed within the country into value-added products, including sunflower oil.
At the same time, oil export figures remain low due to delays in harvesting and the restraint of sunflower sales by Ukrainian farmers. In December, there were massive shelling by Russian occupiers of the logistics infrastructure, leading to a decrease in export potential.
Therefore, approximately 1.3 million tons of sunflower oil have been exported by Ukraine in four months, while the usual level in recent years is 2 million tons.
The situation in the sunflower meal segment is similar – low export rates and a decrease in the potential for the entire season.
The analyst warns that this forecast is a baseline scenario that could worsen due to the ongoing war. If the dynamics of enemy shelling of infrastructure persist, exports may further decrease, along with investments in technology, yield, and resources, which will have long-term consequences for Ukraine’s agricultural sector.