Public joint-stock company State Food-Grain Corporation seeks to buy first 500 out of 3,000 grain wagons planned for purchase by the end of 2017 from Ukrainian manufacturers, Deputy Board Chairman of State Food-Grain Corporation Andriy Zadiraka said at a press conference on Tuesday.

"During six months we had held difficult talks with our Chinese partner and today we have reached agreement to buy a first batch of grain wagons. Now several Ukrainian manufacturers are being discussed. I think that after completing the national approval procedure soon we will buy first 500 wagons by the end of this year," he said.

Zadiraka said that the company is mulling the purchase of wagons from large suppliers – Kriukiv Car Building Works, Dniprovahonmash and Karpaty plant.

"We have proposed to the Chinese corporation to consider the provision of around 420 million from the funds of the credit line, taking into account a shortage of wagons on the market. The only problem that we started the talks six months ago, and the price of wagons is gradually growing," he said.

The government in August 2010 decided to create the State Food and Grain Corporation of Ukraine. The corporation has a chain of branches, comprised of grain storage facilities, flourmills, fodder factories and a cereals factory. The 53 subdivisions of the corporation can store a total of 3.75 million tonnes of grain, which includes the grain handling capacities of Odesa and Mykolaiv ports of some 2.5 million tonnes of grain cargo per year.