Ukraine halved wheat flour exports, but the new season started with massive EU supplies – association.

Due to the war, Ukraine significantly dropped wheat flour exports. Still, the country plans to restore the exports by cooperation with international organizations and due to grain corridor renewal, the industry association says.

Also, unlike other food industries, Ukrainian millers increased operational capacities due to domestic panic demand and are ready to supply domestically and on the international markets.

Being traditionally a significant wheat supplier, Ukraine also strived to develop exports of added-value products, including wheat flour. Again, results were quite impressive - according to APK-inform data, in 2018\19 - 2019/20 MY Ukraine exported about 300 thousand tonnes per season. It joined top-10 of leading global wheat flour suppliers - with Turkey and Kazakhstan being long-term leaders of the list. 

Contrary to other countries-competitors, Ukrainian millers had no centralized industry state support but managed to increase export volumes and widen export geography during the last five years.

“In 2021\22 MY Ukraine halved wheat flour export and supplied abroad only 71 thousand tonnes, as a result of several factors but mostly due to the war conflict and logistics difficulties. But from the beginning of the new marketing year, Ukraine started to boost wheat flour exports, and for July-October country already shipped exported about 50% of all volumes exported in 2021\22 MY,” - commented Rodion Rybchinsky, the president of industry associations Millers of Ukraine.

He also pointed out that the geography of the Ukrainian wheat flour supply has changed dramatically this season. According to Millers of Ukraine, in previous seasons, the UAE was the leading buyer of Ukrainian wheat flour and became a hub for distributing our wheat flour to other countries of the Middle East. But this year, the essential buyers are European countries – Poland, Moldova, Romania, Hungary, and others. "The main reason for such change was new trade routes as traders supplied wheat flour by rails, auto transport or via ports of Danube," - explained Agrisencus, one of the exporters.

Generally, the Ukrainian milling industry demonstrated impressive resilience during the war. The industry got a boost for development due to unprecedented (mostly panic) demand, logistic issues, and the work of international humanitarian organizations. From the beginning of Russian aggression, the population of Ukraine tried to stack the wheat flour and created additional demand, but existing big millers could only sometimes supply products to different regions. This situation made current mills operate at full capacity and helped several dozen small region millers restart their activity. Now milling industry works actively to process grains, and electricity supply distraction impacts its work. Still, the production process is quite resilient, and the stop of energy supply does not cause significant product losses (like for bread making industry). 

“ We now actively work with WFP (World Food Program) for wheat flour supply inside Ukraine and plan to develop our cooperation for export activity. Also, the prolongation of the grain corridor hopefully will help to export more wheat flour by sea. So we hope we will be able to export more wheat flour this season,” – resumed Rybchinsky.

Meanwhile, Turkey, the biggest global exporter of wheat flour, keeps this position strong and continues to export wheat flour. Even more, some new facilities were launched this year to increase the output of wheat flour for exports.