World meat industry news

The 2020 harvest season marked the end in Russia. Despite unfavourable weather conditions in some regions and the pandemic, work proceeded as planned. Farmers were fully supplied with fertilisers and other resources.

Cereals and leguminous crops have been threshed from an area of 46.4 million hectares, with the gross harvest in the originally reported weight of 138.1 million tonnes (126.7 million tonnes in 2019). This year, Russia has had a significant wheat harvest of 88.1 million tonnes in bunker weight (77.9 million tonnes in 2019). The gross harvest of barley amounted to 22.2 million tonnes, maize grain to 14.3 million tonnes, rice to 1.2 million tonnes, and buckwheat to approximately 1 million tonnes. Farmers also harvested 13.3 million tonnes of sunflowers, 2.7 million tonnes of rapeseed, and 4.4 million tonnes of soybeans.

This year the Ministry of Agriculture expects one of the biggest grain harvests in modern history with over 131 million tonnes in net weight. Harvest of oilseeds is projected at 20.5 million tonnes.

Potato production by agricultural enterprises and private farms is expected to reach 7 million tonnes. The gross harvest of vegetables will reach 6.8 million tonnes, with a record of 1.3 million tonnes harvested in winter greenhouses. The production of fruit and berries will remain at last year’s level, which is 1.1 million tonnes. Thus, the harvest will fully meet the needs of the domestic market.

This year, the sown area of crops increased by 83,9 thousand hectares to 79.6 million hectares. In particular, spring sowing of wheat, rye, corn, and buckwheat increased, providing a good basis for further development of the domestic flour-milling and cereals industry. For the 2021 harvest, winter cereal crops have been sown on 19.3 million hectares or 100.6% of the projected area (18.2 million hectares in 2019).