Ukraine’s Minister of
Agriculture, Oleksiy Pavlenko, has been on a working visit to Zhytomyr where he
discussed the state of the winter crops.
Given this was an official
ministerial visit it’s perhaps unsurprising that 100% of planted crop was
reported as having emerged with 94% in good or satisfactory condition and only 6%
in poor condition.
The minister responded by
saying this was a good performance given the prolonged drought and late
planting season which indeed it is, if it as actually the case.
It was also reported that 91%
of the seeds for spring had been secured along with 67% of fertiliser (which is
now being applied, too early in my opinion) and 48% of the plant protection
products.
The minister went on to say
that these figures suggested the satisfactory state and readiness of farms for spring field work.
Worth mentioning that Zhytomyr
translates as rye-world which gives you some idea of what crops grow best
there.
Actually to be fair, south of the
oblast is very good farm land but there is a lot of light, free draining land with low rainfall that
would suit dry land min-till farming plus it's proximity to Kiev means carrots might do well there.
There you go, a free business plan, min-till wheat, oilseed rape, carrot, parsnip rotation, sell the grains off the combine, wash, grade and pre-pack the roots retail in Kiev, boom.