World meat industry news

The Ministry of Agriculture maintains the grain harvest forecast at 132 million tons, said Minister of Agriculture Oksana Lut during the “Siberian Field Day 2024” in the Altai Territory, Interfax writes. “We expect that there will be a number of weather difficulties during harvesting, which may affect the reduction in harvest volume. Therefore, as we harvest, we will adjust our forecast,” Lut added. According to her, farmers have already harvested more than 32 million tons of grain, and the harvesting campaign is moving faster than in 2023.

At Krasnodarzernoproduct-Expo (KZP-Expo), the harvest had already been completed by July 10: it began and ended two weeks earlier than in 2023. The gross wheat harvest at the enterprise is approximately the same as last year, but the quality is worse, compares company general director Evgeny Sidyukov. “The pea yield is lower than last year - 36 c/ha versus 42 c/ha, respectively,” he told Agroinvestor. — The yield of rapeseed this year also decreased to 36 c/ha, while in 2023 the figure was at the level of 46-48 c/ha. But the quality of these crops is no worse than the year before.” The reason for the decline in the quality of wheat and the yield of peas and rapeseed is drought in the Krasnodar region. Protein in most of this year's wheat harvest is 11.5%-12.5%; there is no grain with 13.5% protein at the enterprise, whereas last year its share in the total harvest was 50%.

In the Steppe agricultural holding, early grains such as winter wheat and barley have been harvested by 85%, peas have been harvested completely, says company general director Andrei Neduzhko. This year, Steppe began harvesting earlier than the traditional deadline for the south of Russia - in mid-June. This is due to the early onset of spring and elevated temperatures in March-April, which led to accelerated ripening of the crop, explains the manager. Now the company’s specialists are monitoring and analyzing the ratio of planned and actual yields. According to preliminary estimates, compared to last year, it is predicted to decrease by 10%. “It is still premature to give a qualitative assessment of grain; this will become known based on the results of the harvesting campaign,” Neduzhko commented to Agroinvestor.

However, not everyone experiences a decrease in yield. Thus, at the Progress agricultural company, by July 10, early grain and forage crops were harvested for haylage. “For barley and wheat, our harvest is higher than last year: the yield of the first year was 94 c/ha - this is a record figure for us. We harvested 71.5 centners of wheat per hectare - this is a repeat of our best harvests, the figure is 10% higher than last year,” shares the chairman of the company’s supervisory board, Alexander Nezhenets. True, he adds, the quality of the grain is slightly worse than in 2023 - the protein is mainly 11.5% and 12%. This year the harvesting campaign in Progress began 15-18 days earlier than usual and ended early, as it was carried out quickly and in an organized manner. “In general, we are pleased with the results. True, now there are worries due to the fact that spring crops are not developing well due to drought and heat,” added Nezhenets.

The grain harvest in the Rostov region this year may drop to 10 million tons, TASS writes, citing the deputy governor of the region, Igor Guskov. In 2023, a record 16 million tons of grain were harvested in the region. “This year is difficult in terms of weather conditions, the drought is taking its toll,” Guskov said. As of July 10, the average yield in the region was 34.5 c/ha compared to 40 c/ha a year earlier. A state of emergency due to soil drought was introduced in the Rostov region on June 11. Due to frost and drought, damage to about 934.1 thousand hectares of crops was recorded - almost 20%.

Farmers of the Volgograd region have collected the first million tons of grain, the press service of the regional administration reported. 551 thousand hectares have been threshed out of 1.9 million hectares that are subject to early harvesting. According to the regional governor, Andrei Bocharov, despite the weather disasters the region has faced, “the result exceeds expectations.” He noted that it is expected to collect 4-4.5 million tons of grain, which corresponds to the long-term average. In 2023, the grain harvest in the Volgograd region exceeded 6 million tons.