MOSCOW, Russia (Reuters) — Russia’s winter grains are in a better condition than last year, said Anna Strashnaya, head of the agricultural department at state weather forecaster Hydrometcentre.
However, Ukraine’s winter crops are suffering.
Russia harvested more than 102 million tonnes of grains in 2015, and officials have yet to issue their estimate for the 2016 crop. Some analysts have warned about the risk of damage to next year’s crop due to a lack of rain.
The condition of winter grains in several regions was improved by rains in October through November and by warm weather in November, Strashnaya said.
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As of Nov. 25, 89 percent of winter grains were in good or satisfactory condition, while 11 percent were in a poor condition, according to her estimate.
“This is better than last year but worse than a five-year average of 8.5 percent (of poor winter grains),” Strashnaya said.
Last autumn,16 percent of winter grains were in poor condition.
Russian farmers have cut winter grain seeding because of dry weather in several regions this year. As of Nov. 30, they had seeded winter grains on 41.3 million acres, down from 41.5 million acres a year ago and on 95 percent of the originally planned area.
A combination of warm temperatures and rain has slightly improved the condition of Ukrainian winter grain crops, but a significant portion of them remain in poor state, analyst UkrAgroConsult said Nov. 30.
A severe drought in the summer and autumn in half of Ukrainian regions has forced farmers to stop seeding winter grains, leaving concerns of a poor grain harvest in 2016.
The share of crops in good condition accounted for 28.1 percent as of Nov. 26, compared with 40.6 percent at the same date in 2014, UkrAgroConsult said in a statement.
It said that the share of poor crops rose to 35.6 percent this year from 18.1 percent in 2014.
“In the eastern, partially central and southern regions, major part of sowings is still weak and badly developed,” the consultancy said.
UkrAgroConsult this month cut its forecast for Ukraine’s 2016 wheat harvest by eight percent to 17.5 million tonnes, citing the poor condition of sprouted crops. Winter wheat accounts for 95 percent of Ukraine’s overall what output.
A smaller harvest is likely to cut Ukrainian wheat exports to 3.5 million tonnes in 2016-17, according to traders’ forecasts.
