Seed in Ukraine have not been certified since December 2016. This puts under a threat the spring crops sowing campaign, Executive Director of the Ukrainian Agribusiness Club (UCAB) Oleksandr Zhemoida said at a press conference in Kyiv on Tuesday.

Since the moment of termination of operation of the State Agricultural Inspectorate the Ukrainian Agricultural Policy and Food Ministry was authorized to carry out seed certification. The ministry started creating state-run enterprise State Certification and Agricultural Products Examination Center.

Zhemoida said that at present the seed certification has not been restored. The creation of the state-enterprise has not been finished, and the Ukrainian government has not yet approved the certification rules. Certification of seeds started in 2016 has not been completed.

"According to our information, certification in Dnipropetrovsk region could resume in April or May. The sowing campaign would finish in this period and no one would need our goods. If farmers fail to sow we would have losses. First the Ukrainian economy will face losses as it significantly depends on exports of grain," Syngenta in Ukraine Director General Gebhard Rogenhofer told Interfax-Ukraine.

He said that seed companies are ready to pay for certification services, but no one understands the rules and knows the terms.

"Now we can import our products, but it cannot be certified. It is more difficult for Ukrainian companies in this situation. They are obliged to have the Ukrainian certificate, while foreign companies have OECD and ISTA seed certificates," he said.

He said that the approval of the seed certification rules was put on the agenda of the government meeting scheduled for February 22, but if the issue is not settled in coming week, many farmers would have nothing to sow this spring.

Director for Business Development of Agroscope International Oleh Stetsenko said at the press conference that 25-30% of 400,000-450,000 tonnes of corn, sunflower, soybean and other spring crop seeds required for this spring campaign are waiting for certification.

"Some 150,000 tonnes of seeds has not been certified and cannot be sowed. This means that 2 or 3 million ha of farmland could be left unsowed," he said.

Rogenhofer said that now his company has contracted seed batches and some of them have been paid by clients, but the company cannot sell the products without certification.

Deputy Director of the land cultivation and technical policy department of the Agricultural Policy and Food Ministry Leonid Sukhomlyn said at the press conference that laboratories in 14 regions of Ukraine started accepting applications for certification.

"A total of 1,300 applications have been accepted and 610 samples were selected for tests. The applications and tests are sent to the central accredited laboratory. The tests are ending, but the certifications have not been issued," he said.

He said that inspectors have not been appointed in Dnipropetrovsk, Mykolaiv and Chernihiv regions. Inspectors were appointed in Zakarpattia, Ivano-Frankivsk, Kirovohrad, Luhansk, Ternopil, Kharkiv and Chernivtsi regions, but seed samples have not been selected. He believes that these problems would be settled in two weeks.

UCAB proposes to permit sales of seeds with international OECD and ISTA certificates to settle the problem with seed certification, approve the certification rules and foresee that label numbers assigned by the State Agricultural Inspectorate are valid for the issue of certificates for the existing batches.