Russia harvest update

A cold front bringing wet weather and snow has slowed down harvest a little but then again it usually does this time of year so I wouldn't read too much into it.

Russia have currently harvested 107.3mmt of total grains and pulses in bunker weight from 42.9mha (95%) with an average yield of 2.50mt/ha.

Wheat 61.2mmt from 23.4mha (94%) with an average yield of 2.62mt/ha;

Barley 21.0mmt from 8.9mha (98%) with an average yield of 2.35mt/ha;

Corn 9.3mmt from 2.0mha (77%) with an average yield of 4.55mt/ha;

Sunflower 8.0mmt from 5.6mha (82%) with an average yield of 1.44mt/ha;

Oilseed rape 1.4mmt from 989kha (83%) with an average yield of 1.43mt/ha;

Soyabeans 2.2mmt from 1.6mha (83%) with an average yield of 1.36mt/ha.

Latest USDA weather update for western FSU

The coldest weather of the season settled over the region.

A strong cold front generated rain and wet snow over western and southern Russia as well as neighbouring portions of Ukraine and Belarus.

The moisture, which totalled more than 25 mm (liquid equivalent) in key winter wheat areas of southern Russia, was overall beneficial for vegetative winter grains and oilseeds.

However, temperatures behind the cold front averaged up to 5°C below normal, with the coldest conditions (night-time readings of -10°C or lower) in northern-most growing areas likely hastening winter crops into dormancy.

Even with some snow and cold, winter wheat in Russia’s Southern and North Caucasus Districts was not yet dormant.

In Ukraine, despite the changeable and unsettled weather, mostly dry conditions in north-central parts of the country facilitated corn and sunflower harvesting.

In contrast, winter wheat in southern Ukraine benefited from 10 to 25 mm (locally more) of rain.

Across the remainder of Russia, an early-season snowfall halted spring wheat harvesting in eastern portions of the country, while a sharp cold snap ended the growing season east of the Volga District.

Autumn planting nearly finished

The autumn planting season is nearing completion with reports that crops in some areas of eastern Russia are struggling in dry conditions.

Ukraine has planted 7.1mha of winter grains (94%) which is made up of 6.1mha of wheat and triticale, 845kha barley and 165kha rye.

Russian has planted 16.2mha of winter grains (98%), I’m still waiting for a breakdown of crops.

Meanwhile Kyrgyzstan has planted 54kha of winter grains (28%) including 50.6kha of wheat and 3.5kha of barley.

Russian harvest data confusion cleared up

Rosstat's Russian harvest figures in the previous posts were from the beginning of October which now makes perfect sense.  Thanks go to Damien from Inter-Courtage for clearing that up.

Must try harder.

Russia looks to India for milk

A team of experts from Russia are set to carry out inspections of milk processing units in India to explore the possibility of importing dairy products from them.

If successful exporting butter, cheese and milk powder could start by December.

This follows on from last month’s visit to Moscow by India’s commerce ministry who discussed resuming meat and dairy exports previously banned by Russia because of a foot and mouth outbreak years ago.

Good news for India perhaps but not what Russian domestic producers would want to hear as they looked to capitalise on the sanctions placed on US and EU supply’s.

Russian officials might be extolling the benefit sanctions will play in building local food production but they don’t seem to be doing anything to support it.

By looking to other countries to supply the immediate shortfall in supplies that sanctions have created they will be delaying further any investment in domestic production.

Ukraine harvest update

Ukraine has harvested 52.8mmt of grains and pulses from 13.0mha or 88% of the planned area (excluding Crimea) with an average total yield of 4.04mt/ha.

This is up on the same time last year when total yields were running at 3.68mt/ha.

Current figures breakdown as 16.4mmt of corn from 3.0mha (65%) with an average yield of 5.37mt/ha; 9.3mmt of sunflowers from 4.9mha (95%) with an average yield of 1.89mt/ha; 3.3mha soyabeans from 1.6mha (78%) with an average yield of 2.06mt/ha.

Harvest of buckwheat is now complete with 181kmt from 129kha giving an average yield of 1.39mt/ha.

Russia harvest update

According to Rosstat (the State Statistics Service) Russia has harvested 95.8mmt of grains.

This includes 41.6mmt of wheat with an average yield of 2.89mt/ha and 3.6mmt of corn with an average yield of 4.83mt/ha.

The thing is last week the Russian Min of Ag reported 60.9mmt of wheat with an average yield of 2.63mt/ha and 8.8mmt of corn with an average yield of 4.56mt/ha.

The difference in wheat could possibly be explained as winter and spring crop (unlikely) but corn?

I'm looking forward to the Min of Ags next report which might clear up the confusion.

Russia asking farmers to increase production

Russia is asking and presumably expecting farmers to increase domestic production to fill the gap left by banning imports from the US and EU.

However boosting output requires investment and no-one knows how long the import ban will be in place.

It is supposed to be for one year but as it was brought in overnight it equally could be lifted at the stroke of a pen.

This is not a situation that will encourage major investment.

What will be required is for tangible action to be put in place to tackle issues such as high interest rates and problematic regulations before significant investments will be made.

Then Russia might see businesses looking to take advantage of the situation.

Aphids in Ukraine and Russian winter wheat

Current weather conditions in Ukraine and Russia has been dry and unseasonably warm which will favour cold blooded aphids.

In warm weather aphids migrate into winter cereal crops and reproduce.

The issue with aphids this time of year is not injury from direct feeding but as they feed they introduce plant viruses much in the same way intravenous drug users do when sharing a needle.

They transmit barley yellow dwarf luteovirus (BYDV) and very low populations, which may go unnoticed, can cause economic damage.

The two aphids in question are Grain Aphid (sitobion avenae) and Bird Cherry-Oat Aphid (rhopalosiphum padi) both of which I have seen in Ukraine and Russian.

As yet have never met a local agronomist who knows what they are or could identify one.

These two aphids and the problem they cause have been well documented in Western Europe but I haven't seen any research data or information on control or thresholds in Ukraine or Russia.

I'm not saying it’s not there I just haven’t seen it or have been shown anything by local agronomists.

In the UK losses up to 2.5mt/ha have been recorded, losses in Ukraine and Russia might be low but they could be significant.

Control is based around imidacloprid seed treatment and autumn applications of pyrethroids, neither of which are currently done so if they are causing a problem they are not being controlled.

Ukraine wheat plantings may exceed the plan

The Ukraine Ministry of Agrarian Policy has declared winter wheat plantings may exceed the

original plan of 6.2mha due to favourable weather conditions and a good situation on the world market.

Before my kids came along I used to read books, one that has stayed in my memory and I occasionally quote from is Jeremy Paxman’s The Political Animal.

Paxman is an English journalist who worked for the BBC and his infamous interview when he asked the Home Secretary the same question 12 times in an unsuccessful attempt to get a straight answer gives you an inkling of what he’s like.

In his book he explains how he dislikes politicians because they would sell their grandmother to gain votes or parade their wife and kids in front of the press in a display of family unity the morning after they had been caught with their secretary if it meant it would save their job.

With that in mind let’s take another look at that statement from the Minister of Agriculture.

The Minister has declared that winter wheat plantings may exceed the original plan. 

That they might well do but what plan?  Prediction or forecast might be a better word although I think he may actually believe it’s a plan.

One of the biggest challenges Ukraine has is to shake off years of command led thinking which you can see in the steady flow of announcements and declarations about targets, plans and outputs.

The government pushes farms to follow policy but provides little incentive to do so, it uses threat that if you don’t do what we ask then we will cause problems elsewhere in your business.

For the last five or so years I have been told by local administrators that I must immediately farm livestock as it has been decided by central government and can I supply a business plan also immediately for the new dairy unit or pig farm.

(The trick here is to agree then do nothing, several months will go by until you’re called in to the office to be told off again, you apologies, say you’re working on it then do nothing, by the time it comes around again he’ll have been replaced and the whole cycle can start again.)

Favourable weather conditions? 

It’s been dry which means planting has progressed but that dryness needs some wetness to get crops up and ready for the winter.  Just because it’s dry and we are all planted up doesn't necessarily follow we would continue to plant more.  Generally that’s not how a farm works; we have a plan based on a rotation, machinery output, seeds and chems purchased, diesel ordered, budgets, cash flows, holidays and so on.

A good situation on the world market?

That’s not how I read the market; global grain surplus, multi-year low prices, input costs up.  My guess is the sensible route would be to hold additional winter plantings to see how the market develops by the spring and adapt accordingly.

In his book Paxman discovered that 60% of British Prime Ministers had lost one or both parents at a young age compared to the national average of 1%.

 

Not sure what that says about politicians but it screams something.

You can watch that Paxman interview here.

Latest USDA weather update for eastern FSU

A mix of rain and snow (10-45 mm liquid equivalent) hampered spring wheat harvesting in northern Kazakhstan, as well as the Urals and Siberia Districts in Russia.

Early- to mid-week showers slowed fieldwork throughout the region.

At the end of the week, however, cold air accompanied another surge of moisture, causing the rain to change to snow in Russia and extreme northern Kazakhstan.

Accumulating snow was likely in these areas, halting spring wheat harvesting.

Temperatures averaged about 2 to 6°C below normal in Russia and extreme northern Kazakhstan.

Farther south, dry weather returned to Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and eastern Uzbekistan, allowing cotton harvesting to accelerate in the wake of recent rain.

Latest USDA weather update for western FSU

In Ukraine and western Russia, unseasonably warm, showery weather (5-25 mm or more) favoured early winter wheat and barley development, aiding germination and emergence.

The showers likely slowed local fieldwork, including summer crop harvesting and additional winter grain planting.

The rain was overall beneficial, however, providing a welcome boost in topsoil moisture which will help with winter grain establishment.

Elsewhere in the region, mostly dry, unseasonably warm weather favoured summer crop harvesting in Belarus.

Temperatures in Belarus, Ukraine, and western Russia averaged about 3 to 6°C above normal, helping spur winter grain development.

Russia harvest update

Russia has harvested 106.2mmt of total grains and pulses in bunker weight from 42.4mha (94%) with an average yield of 2.50mt/ha.

This compares favourably with 2013 production figures (88.6mmt, 2.21mt/ha) and breaks down as follows:

Wheat 60.9mmt from 23.1mha (94%) with an average yield of 2.63mt/ha;

Barley 20.9mmt from 8.9mha (97%) with an average yield of 2.36mt/ha;

Corn 8.8mmt from 1.9mha (73%) with an average yield of 4.56mt/ha;

Sunflower 7.7mmt from 5.3mha (78%) with an average yield of 1.45mt/ha;

Oilseed rape 1.4mmt from 975kha (82%) with an average yield of 1.44mt/ha;

Soyabeans 1.9mmt from 1.4mha (72%) with an average yield of 1.36mt/ha.

Ukrainian Agrarian Confederation corn harvest estimate

Ukraine’s latest corn harvest update shows 14.7mmt of crop from 2.8mha (60%) with an average yield of 5.28mt/ha.

The Ukrainian Agrarian Confederation has estimated final harvest volumes will reach 27.0mmt.

That will require the yield to improve from the current average of 5.28mt/ha to 5.78mt/ha, an increase of 0.50mt/ha or 9%.

Except what is actually required is the remaining crop to be harvested (1.88mha) will need to average 6.54mt/ha.

Personally I don’t see that happening, in my experience yields tend to fall as you move on to the later planted crops and weather starts to have a greater impact on harvesting operations.

Plus there is always a percentage of crop that doesn't get harvested until the spring.

I would suggest 27.0mmt is a great aspiration but in reality and given some consideration I would say it’s unlikely.

Back to the future

One of my earliest memories of politics in agriculture was 1984 and the introduction of EU milk quotas to drain milk lakes that had been created by previous policies aimed at increasing output.

At the time I was working in my first full time job on a small farm that had gone out of milking cows in the seventies during the previous effort to reduce over production, known as the Golden Handshake.

The farm still had each cows name written on chalk boards above individual stalls, even after fifteen years the boss hadn't been able to take them down such was the emotional attachment to his animals.

Golden handshakes and quotas were and still are blunt instruments used by politicians determined to engineer simple solutions to complex agricultural issues and as today's dairy farmers complain that milk sells for less than water you’d be forgiven for thinking they haven’t work.

I'm not saying it’s wrong to have agricultural policies that encourage safe, sustainable, viable farming, far from it, food production is such a fundamental important business it would be wrong to leave it to the free market.

The problem seems to lie in the disconnect between what is actually possible on a farm and the time frame and what politicians and policy advisor's believe is possible and want to happen.

I clearly remember when quotas were introduced seeing angry, emotional dairy farmers on TV saying it wasn't possible to switch cows on and off like machines and having to send productive in calf animals to slaughter.

Today a familiar story but at the other end of the production continuum is coming out of Russia with calls to ramp up production to cover the shortfall in food supplies caused by the ban on EU and US imports.

This had led to a number of Russian ministers making unrealistic promises about replacing banned products by increasing output with no reference to how that was actually going to be achieved.

As one Russian cattle farmer recently said, “There were around 4 million beef cows in 1991, now there's only 1.5 million, increasing meat production cannot happen overnight, however badly the politicians want it…it's animals, not machines."

Echoes across thirty years from British farmers in 1984 to Russian farmers today.

Russian harvest update

Russia has harvested 104.1mmt of grains and pulses from 41.7mha or 92% of the planned area with an average total yield of 2.50mt/ha.

Last year yield was 2.21mt/ha so a slight improvement.

This breaks down as 60.4mmt of wheat from 22.9mha (93%) with an average yield of 2.64mt/ha; 20.8mmt of barley from 8.8mha (97%) with an average yield of 2.36mt/ha; 7.6mmt of corn from 1.7mha (62%) with an average yield of 4.59mt/ha; 7.2mmt of sunflowers from 4.9mha (72%) with an average yield of 1.47mt/ha; and 1.6mmt of soyabeans from 1.2mha (61%) with an average yield of 1.35mt/ha.

Ukraine harvest update

How time flies, one minute I was talking about the start of harvest then the next minute we are
looking at the finishing stages.

Ukraine has harvested 48.2mmt of grains and pulses from 12.3mha or 83% of the planned area giving an average total yield of 3.91mt/ha.

This is up on the same time last year when total yields were running at 3.54mt/ha.

Current figures breakdown as 11.8mmt of corn from 2.3mha (50%) with an average yield of 5.10mt/ha; 8.8mmt of sunflowers from 4.67mha (91%) with an average yield of 1.89mt/ha; 2.9mha soyabeans from 1.38mha (77%) with an average yield of 2.09mt/ha.

Ukraine wheat yields up

International agri-businesses, as in large scale, progressive and not small scale, cash strapped, local farmers, are announcing some heady winter wheat yields.

Trigon Agri managed 5.61mt/ha in Kharkov and an impressive 5.99mt/ha in Kirovograd.

Kernel Holding is reporting 5.60mt/ha from 30kha of winter wheat.

All of this is great news and a combination of good management and favourable weather is rightly being cited as the reason for improved crop productivity.

But in the Ukraine agri-business environment this news could have repercussions that are less than good.

If you look at farming around the world, simply put they are either low input output large scale systems as found in Australia and Canada or high input output small scale systems such as those in parts of Europe.

What is being tried in Ukraine is high input output over large areas and is without precedent.

Early on in Ukraine’s agricultural renaissance it became apparent that simply lifting high yielding agri systems from Europe and the USA and dropping them into Ukraine didn't work.

The fundamentals of farming remained but Ukraine has its own unique set of issues that eroded anticipated high crop yields. 

Add to that the issue that businesses were trying to implement a farming system that had not been tried with problems we hadn't anticipated and you can understand why the financial results and physical performance were all over the place.

The point I’m leading up to is that Ukraine agri-business are still immature, have over stretched and over promised and are often run by none farming management with short term views who react to markets. 

So if wheat yields well this year it will be gung-ho into wheat this autumn followed by a scratching of heads when for a multitude of reasons it doesn't do as well as we had expected.

It is no joke when I recount stories of investors or accountants who seriously argued to grow 100% oilseed rape or 100% seed potatoes because these were the most profitable crop that year.

While you don’t strictly need farmers to manage these large agri-businesses it does help to have that long term view and grudging acceptance on board that not every crop in every year is going stick rigidly to the plan.

We have rotations to spread risk, they teach you that in week one at agricultural college.

Ukraine harvest update

Ukraine has harvested 31.2mmt of early grains and pulses from 8.8mha.

This is 90% of the planned areas without Crimea giving a yield of 3.54mt/ha.

At the same point last year they had harvested 29.4mmt from 9.5mha with a yield of 3.11mt/ha.

This year’s harvest was slow to get started but seems to have caught up and past last year both in terms of timeliness and yield.

Scores on the doors are winter wheat 3.89mt/ha; winter barley 3.02mt/ha; rye (or as I call it, why?) 2.49mt/ha; oats 2.42mt/ha; peas 2.39mt/ha; winter oilseed rape 2.43mt/ha.

Not quite sure how these latest numbers tally with the last report, seems there are some anomalies, lets wait and see how the next announcement fits.

Meet Stan

We don’t talk about Stan often enough so here’s a quick history lesson.

In an effort to control nomadic and pastoral tribes of central Asia, Stalin sat in his Moscow office and drew lines on a map.

These lines became the lands of, or the Stan's of, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, Tajiks, Turkmen, Uzbeks and Afghans.

Since gaining independence the lines stayed and each country either forged ahead in an effort to create a more open society or desperately and sometimes violently hung on to the mechanisms of their former soviet occupiers.

Actually this is a common issue right across the FSU; ex-soviet countries that despised the occupation but cling on to all the bad bits like monumentally depressing bureaucracy and repressing free expression.

Some of the Stan’s and regions within the Stan’s are mountainous, arid with thin soils and not suited to arable farming but big bits of it are.

Kazakhstan is the sixth largest wheat producer in the world and can produce 27mmt of grain in a good year (2011) or if it doesn't rain, 17mmt as predicted for this year.

So far they have cut 383kha producing 436kmt of grain yielding 1.14mt/ha.

Not a brilliant granted but it’s not difficult to imagine yields increasing through improved plant genetics, investment in equipment, technology and training.

And here's the interesting bit, Kazakhstan has 30 million hectares of arable land.

Ukraine harvest update and other stuff

Ukraine has produced 28.8mmt of grains and oilseeds from 8.7mha.

Dnepropetrovsk, Zaporozhye and Kherson oblasts have completed harvesting early grains and pulses with Kirovograd, Kharkiv, Poltava, Mykolaiv and Odessa oblasts on the final stages.

Crop yields currently stand at wheat, 18.5mmt with an average yield 3.75mt/ha (some record) and barley 7.6mmt averaging 2.93mt/ha.

Wheat quality is said to be similar to last year with bread making grades 1, 2 and 3 accounting for 63% of crop sampled thus far.

Since the start of 14-15MY Ukraine has exported nearly 2.6mmt of grains including 1.0mmt of wheat, 1.1mmt of barley and 360kmt of maize.

After suggesting half a million tonne the Min of Ag is now saying crop losses in Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts are not critical but then don’t go on to elaborate what they mean by critical.

As Russian sanctions against Ukrainian agri-products continue to bite there is talk of solving this little conundrum by selling through a third country which goes shows that Belarus does have a use after all.

Ukraine set to harvest a record winter wheat crop

The Director of the Ukrainian Hydrometeorological Centre is saying that this year’s winter wheat crop will break all records.

Not entirely sure what the Hydrometeorological Centre actually is, I'd always assumed it was the weatherman but they issue crop yield predictions so I might have got that wrong.

Either way to say the winter wheat crop will break all records is a big statement considering it doesn't include Crimea or the crop from the conflict zone but does take in to account the harvest is coming to a close.

It's a bit like saying Germany will win this game when they are five nil up against Brazil at halftime, it’s basically in the bag.

He does go on to say that other winter and spring crops are also looking good but high temperatures may adversely affect the yield of maize.

I could do his job.

Belarus harvest update

Belarus has harvested 1.735mha or 72% of the planned area.

They have produced nearly 7.0mmt of grains with an average yield of 3.98mt/ha.

They are also reporting that they are on top of next season’s crop with 138kha of land (already) prepared for planting winter oilseed rape which apparently constitutes 33% of the plan.

All this centralised agricultural planning must make the job so much easier for farmers; imagine if your government interfered helped you plan your business, wouldn't you be truly grateful.

Grain exports continue

In the first month of the new marketing year Russia exported 2.8mmt of grains.

That’s an increase of 17.5% compared with the same period last year.

Presumably it’s a case of sell while you still can although long term I can’t see sanctions having any meaningful impact on grain exports from Russia, people have to eat.

Meanwhile in Ukraine sea ports continue to increase grain exports.

According to APK-Inform, last week grain exports increased to 494kmt from the previous weeks 463kmt.

Russia considers banning everything

In a continuation of the tit-for-tat sanction related actions and reactions; Russia is saying it might ban the import of plant growing products from EU countries.

According to Russian officials it's because the European quarantine security system doesn't work.

I suppose they have to produce some tangible reason for each import ban to keep WTO off their case but it is all rather transparent and childish.

At this rate Russia won’t be importing anything at all by Christmas and it’s not that long ago they banned that as well.

MH17

On the 17^th July a missile was fired at civilian flight MH17 bringing it down inside the conflict region of

eastern Ukraine.

All 298 passengers and flight crew including 80 children on board perished.

I don’t even know where to begin with this.

As a father with young children I am particularly sensitive the images of children’s belongings strewn across the wheat and sunflower fields.

This is a landscape I am very familiar with, I live and work in it, the images on TV might show what looks like another world but it is in fact the same one we all inhabit.

The ground war is dreadful, the indiscriminate bombing of civilians, the confusion, the destruction, the broken shredded bodies, this is not a Ukraine I am familiar with.

Then bodies, body parts, bits of aircraft and private possessions started raining down out of the blue sky on to the innocent villagers living below.

Peasant villagers doing nothing more than anyone of us would be doing under the circumstances, trying to live as best as they could, hoping and praying the distant thunder of guns would pass by without visiting death and misery.

This war is difficult to penetrate to understand what is happening and I’m not going to try and explain it here, what I will say is the downing of MH17 may have shifted the outcome of the war in to its final stages.

How much the shooting down of MH17 has to do with this is speculation but I imagine that bringing the eyes of the world on to this squalid war must have some impact on those who find themselves in de facto charge.

One thing I am fairly certain of, as bodies remain unaccounted for and as the war passes over the wreckage destroying evidence, is it will not be forgotten.

Someone will be held accountable for the crime, be it at the Hague or elsewhere be it next year or within in the next ten.  

This crime will not simply pass.

Russia Ukraine tit-for-tat bans

I have lost track of the tit-for-tat bans surrounding sanctions imposed on Russia but here are few of the headlines I did keep track of this week.

Russia bans dairy imports from Ukraine citing a lack of proper quality control as grounds for the decision.

Russia bans imports of Ukrainian sunflower, soybeans and meal due to contamination with weed seeds from the quarantine list.

Russia bans Polish fruit and vegetables because authorities said the imports had unacceptable levels of pesticide residues and nitrates.

Russia stops Ukraine juice imports "to protect the rights of consumers".

Ukraine bans pork imports from Russia following reports that African Swine Fever virus had appeared in several parts of Russia.

Then dutifully Belarus considers a ban on Ukrainian beef and dairy. 

Where is the WTO in all of this, I’ve not heard a peep out of the toothless quango.

I can’t help thinking it’s farmers who end up paying the price of principle.

French wheat harvest down on estimates

The French are saying their wheat crop, the biggest in the EU, may not yield as well as they previously thought.

Estimates are currently suggesting the crop will be down by 800kmt, IGC peg the crop at 38.8mmt and USDA at 38.5mmt.

They are reporting a better picture for barley estimating it to be up 1mmt on the year at 11.3mmt and rapeseed would reach an anticipated 5.2mmt.

All eyes on Germany then as the second biggest EU producer, early reports are harvest and grain quality is looking good.

Hate to rain on anyone’s parade but Ukraine and Russian (assuming they will be allowed to export in to the EU and I suspect they will) wheat harvest is looking good both in terms of yield and quality and for political reasons the EU will be looking very favourably on agri-imports from Ukraine.

Belarus harvest update

Belarus has 4.0mmt of crop in the shed.

So far they have harvested 1.0mha or 43% of the planned cropping area with an impressive yield of 3.94mt/ha.

Winter oilseed rape harvest is all but over with 343kha producing an average yield of 2.27mt/ha.

I think they are still on target to complete harvest in twenty days, however many combines they do eventually use it is still an impressive achievement.

Latest USDA weather update for western FSU

Volume 101, no. 30, full report here.

Mostly dry, hot weather persisted in Russia, while showers and thunderstorms further boosted summer crop prospects elsewhere.

High pressure remained centered over western Kazakhstan, maintaining sunny skies in Russia and a warm southerly flow across the western two-thirds of the region.

Temperatures averaged 2 to 5°C above normal in most growing areas, with daytime highs in the lower to middle 30s (degrees C) causing some stress to reproductive summer crops in southern portions of Ukraine and Russia. 

In Russia, the heat was accompanied by sunny skies, which accelerated winter wheat harvesting.

However, the Rostov Oblast in the west-central Southern District has reported little - if any - precipitation since June 21, causing deteriorating yield prospects for summer crops, in particular sunflowers.

In contrast, the heat and humidity over Moldova, Ukraine, and Belarus was accompanied by widespread showers and thunderstorms (10-50 mm, locally more), which maintained excellent prospects for silking corn and blooming sunflowers.

Farther east, dry albeit cooler weather (1-3°C below normal) prevailed in the southeastern Volga District, promoting spring wheat maturation.

Russian harvest update

Russia has harvested 12.7mha or 27% of the crop, producing 43.6mmt dirty weight with a slight drop in yield from the last report to 3.44mt/ha.

At the same time last year Russia had cut the same area, 12.7mha, but produced 35.5mmt yielding less at 2.79mt/ha.

It's looking like this years crop is going to be better than last although Russia might have problems finding customers for all that grain if sanctions continue to be imposed.

Current individual crop yields stand at wheat 35.9mmt, yield 3.64mt/ha (3.03mt/ha in 2013); barley 3.8mmt, yield 3.05mt/ha (2.29mt/ha); oilseed rape 367kmt, yield 1.65mt/ha (1.71mt/ha).

Here is the moos...

When I was an eighteen year old tractor driver, putting in dawn ‘till midnight shifts in the the English county of Nottinghamshire, the default radio station on in every cab was BBC Radio One.

It was unmitigated toss.

If you have never listened to it count yourself lucky; saccharine, amorphous, putrefying drivel with a middle of the road play list that was on a thirty minute loop.

I was assaulted by this stuff sixteen hours a day, seven days a week, for the entire harvest and planting campaign.

Then late one night shift I inexplicably fiddled with the knobs and stumbled across BBC Radio Four, my life changed forever.

With news, political talk, opinion, documentaries, stories, plays, travel, science and some of the best comedy I have ever heard the long days in the tractor cab were immediately transformed.

Now I could entertain and educate myself while driving in straight lines.

Recently I thought my life was complete when that brilliant woman from the R4 Food Programme, @SheilaDillon started following me on Twitter.

I topped Sheila this morning by appearing on the Farming Today Programme talking about farming in Ukraine and Russia.

I think it’s time to retire.

Why, if Mr Spok beamed down to Russia, his brain would explode

Winston Churchill famously described Russia as a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.

Spend some time in the workers paradise and few would disagree; you soon become accustomed to expecting the unexpected.

And it’s advisable not to spend too long trying to figure out logic behind the long list of oddities that confront you because there isn't one.

I've lost count the times I have walked in to a hotel, guest house or apartment after a long and difficult day to find only after several minutes of frustrated fumbling in the dark that the light switch is not in the logical place but is inconveniently tucked away behind the door.

Or in a different room,

The first few times this happens you find yourself starring in disbelief, spluttering like Jeremy Clarkson “for the love of Nigel Mansell's moustache why?”

If you ask a Russian you will be met with a shrug of the shoulders and a vague smile that seems to say haven’t you got better things to worry about.

And they’d be right.

Beam me up Scotty.

Ukraine harvest latest yields

Ukraine has now harvested 23.6mmt of early grains and pulses from 7.1mha or 72% of the crop.

Average yield has seen a slight increase over last weeks report and now stands at 3.33mt/ha (compared to 3.03mt/ha same time last year).

Individual crop areas and yields currently stand at wheat 4.5mha, 3.64mt/ha; barley 2.4mha, 2.86mt/ha; rye 82kha, 2.36mt/ha;oats 25kha, 2.06mt/ha; peas 133kha, 2.31mt/ha; oilseed rape 788kha, 2.34mt/ha.

Ukraine conflict harvest part 2

The ongoing conflict in Ukraine is undoubtedly affecting farming but by how much?

Ukraine's Ag Minister estimated 500,000mt or more might be lost in the warring region; I estimated upwards of 1.1mmt could be at risk, so between us we are probably in the ball park.

We do differ on if that grain is “lost” or “at risk”.

There are a couple of things to take in to account before we completely write off that grain; be it half a million or one million tonnes.

It is difficult to make a clear assessment of how the war is going but it is clearly not going to Poroshenko’s plan who back in May proclaimed it was going to be over in a matter of hours not days and certainly not months.

However through the white noise of internet chatter it appears, at least it does to me, that the Ukraine Army might be gaining ground and the truly despicable and indefensible murder of 298 innocent people including 80 children aboard flight MH17 has moved the conflict on to another level possibly beyond the reach of the separatists.

All of this leads me to believe the ground war might be moving in to the final stages and if not finished off outright it might be contained - I certainly hope it’s not going to go the other way.

Consequently any un-harvested crop still standing in the conflict region may become accessible to farmers and we may see the bulk of it eventually gathered.

Cereal crops like wheat and barley will stand a long time after they are ripe and it is possible although not desirable to cut them through August and even into September with little loss of yield and quality, I know because I've done it.

Corn, sunflower and long season soya harvest doesn't really get started until September so they hopefully will be ready after the resolution of the conflict.

So the known unknown is how much of that at risk crop will be lost crop?

My feeling is very little; it’s too valuable to leave in the fields and if you know anything about Ukraine’s history of famine during the 1930’s which was engineered from Moscow you will understand that Ukrainians simply can not leave food in the field to rot.

Russian harvest update

Russia has harvested 10.7mha or 23% producing 37.2mmt dirty weight yielding 3.48mt/ha.

The yield has dropped a smidge on last week’s report but is still up on the same point last year (2.84mt/ha although I’m not sure of the benefit of these year by year comparisons, what does it really tell us).

Wheat 31.4mmt, yield 3.66mt/ha (3.05mt/ha in 2013); barley 3.1mmt, yield 3.15mt/ha (2.34mt/ha); oilseed rape 342kmt, yield 1.63mt/ha (1.7mt/ha).

Belarus harvest storming ahead

The Belorussian Deputy Minister of Agriculture announced they will complete harvest in twenty days.

Well done you.

They are planning to harvest 2.4mha of grains and pulses and achieve a record harvest.

Let me see now, 2.4mha in twenty days means they will need to harvest a reasonable 120kha per day for the duration of the campaign.

Assuming an easy combine output of 20ha per day then the will need about 6,000 combines to keep on target.

Hang on one minute, only last week the Minister of Agriculture informed us that they had 12,000 combines match fit, what are the other 6,000 combines doing during harvest?

Or is the daily output closer to 10ha per day?

Then it's a case of not so well done you.

Ukraine: the feed trough of the Soviet Union?

It's a fact that every article ever written about Ukraine agriculture starts off with the assertion that the country was once the bread basket of the Soviet Union.

Except it wasn't.

It did produce a lot of grain but my local reliable sources tell me that at the time quality was low and most was used for animal feed.

But Ukraine, the feed trough of the Soviet Union doesn't have the same ring to it.

Ukrainian agriculture consistently fails to live up to expectations and production figures stubbornly scrape along at unimpressive low levels although this year is looking like it might be slightly better than the average.

Compared to the ten year average for EU27, Ukraine grain yields ranks 24^th right behind Romania and Estonia and just ahead of Greece and Cyprus.

Hardly stuff of legends.

Recognising that a lot of Ukraine’s wheat comes from subsistence farmers who lack technology and finance for seeds and fertilisers which skews the average yield downwards, the professionally run well financed agribusinesses don’t do much better either.

Wheat yields published by four of the big agribusiness rarely exceeded 4.5mt/ha which would rank them 13^th out of an EU29. 

Better but still not great when you consider the average yield for the top five producing countries was over 8.4mt/ha.

So why does Ukrainian agriculture consistently fail to live up to the hype?

Depressingly it's a long, long list of technical, economic and political issues but less depressingly it is relatively easy to pick off some of the low hanging fruit and to see an immediate uplift.

I class those changes in to three areas.

Those that cost nothing but involve a change to management, often not doing something like not "sealing in the moisture" which is a cultivation practice that can best be described as recreational.

Those that cost a relatively small investment such as changing the five year old sprayer nozzles.

Then there is the big investment expenditure such as buying more efficient and effective equipment that allows you to do the job better and in a tighter timing window.

Then overarching all of this is the attention to detail brought about by bringing local staff on with the new approach.

A positive from this is that once those new, young managers are introduced to new methods and management styles they rarely want to go back.

The future is bright for Ukraine even if it doesn't much feel like it right at this moment.

In the Kingdom of the blind the one eyed man is King

When I go off message from farming into politics I'm conversely accused of being either a Kremlin backed troll or a Western stooge.

Sometimes I read something that means I must take that risk.

Russia’s former finance minister Alexei Kudrin said conservative forces had seized upon the Ukraine crisis to push the country towards an isolationist course, and this ran counter to the interests of Russian business, which is a fair comment.

Although a former finance minister, Mr Kudrin still maintains high level connections as one of Putin’s trusted economic advisors and goes on to say that the stand-off with the west will hurt the countries modernisation.

He may be connected in Moscow, is he connected to the rest of Russia?

Every minute of every day I am totally underwhelmed by the sheer pace of Russia’s modernisation.

Ukraine harvest update, shows what I know

Despite my know all predictions of a not so good Ukrainian harvest because of blah blah blah (see previous posts), today’s figures let me down as yields stubbornly continue to climb.

With 5.93mha or 60% cut overall average yield is now up at 3.22mt/ha.

That’s wheat at 3.49mt/ha; barley at 2.80mt/ha; rye at 2.34mt/ha; oats 1.73mt/ha; peas 2.26mt/ha; oilseed rape 2.28mt/ha.

But we have all experienced that sinking feeling of disappointment as the last field comes in and knocks the feet out from under what was a promising year.

A lot can still happen between now and the finish tape.