World meat industry news

The situation with fuel supplies to Russian agricultural producers has begun to stabilize, TASS reports citing Deputy Minister of Agriculture Maxim Uvaidov.

According to him, the Ministry of Agriculture was most worried about the southern regions. Let us remind you that they began to experience problems with the availability of these products before anyone else. In his opinion, the measures taken by the Government, as well as the Ministry of Energy and other responsible departments will help in the near future to eliminate interruptions in the import of all types of fuel for farmers. He recalled that farmers are now carrying out harvesting work, and some of them have begun sowing winter grain crops.

Previously, the ministry, together with the Government and the agricultural department, prepared a plan to solve the problem. In particular, the Cabinet of Ministers increased the standards for the supply of motor gasoline and diesel fuel to the stock exchange, and also organized daily monitoring of fuel purchases for agricultural producers. Prior to this, the Government also considered increasing the duty on exports of petroleum products to $250 per ton, but later abandoned this idea due to its inexpediency. The Ministry of Agriculture itself considered stopping the export of petroleum products until the situation improved, and the Ministry of Energy planned to allow fuel supplies abroad only to oil refineries in order to stop the so-called “gray exports.” It was later established that the cause of the fuel shortage was the creation of an artificial shortage. This could also be the reason for the price increase. The Ministry of Energy promised to identify and stop all such illegal actions. The Government also implemented the idea of the Ministry of Agriculture to stop the export of petroleum products.

The problem with gasoline and diesel fuel in the country began to be observed since the beginning of summer, when these products rose several times in price to a record level. And in August, interruptions in its supplies began to be observed. In particular, agricultural producers from five large southern agricultural regions – the Astrakhan and Volgograd regions, as well as Kalmykia, Kuban and Crimea – complained about the problem. Then fuel shortages began to be observed in other southern regions, as well as in the Novosibirsk, Ryazan and Saratov regions. On August 22, the Ministry of Energy explained this problem by difficulties with delivering products to the south due to the tourist season. However, what speaks against this is that in September, when this season ended, the situation did not change, and problems began to be observed outside the south. Now, thanks to the joint work of the Government and departments, fuel prices have gradually begun to drop to their previous level, and new supplies of fuel to the regions have begun.