Ukraine exports some 21 m tonnes of grain in 2009/2010 MY, says UGA

Kyiv, July 5 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukraine tentatively exported 21 million tonnes of grain in the previous marketing year (MY, July 2009- June 2010), according to President of the Ukrainian Grain Association (UGA) Volodymyr Klymenko.

"In the previous marketing year we exported some 21 million tonnes of grain and this marketing year export would be the same," he said at a press conference at Interfax-Ukraine on Monday.

He said that grain exports in the previous marketing year could be more by 1-1.5 million tonnes if not for problems with VAT reimbursement to grain traders.

Klymenko said that the start of the new grain season would be rather difficult due to unsettled problems with VAT reimbursement to grain traders. He said that now we see very low prices of grain of the new harvest.

"July-September would be very difficult months as prices would be very low," he said.

He said that grain traders have not received government domestic loan bonds to return a debt on VAT reimbursement to them, although they had asked the government to issue bonds before the start of the harvesting campaign.