Agrotrade plants 20% larger winter wheat area in 2021/22
Agrotrade Group will plant more than 18 thou. ha of winter wheat in the 2021/22 season, which is around 3 thou. ha more than the previous year.
The company's machinery is currently carrying out sowing in the fields of Kharkiv, Chernihiv, Sumy and Poltava regions.
"Weather conditions for sowing winter crops are now favourable: there is enough moisture in the soil, and the air temperature is typical for this time of year. All this gives us optimism for a rich crop next year," observes Oleksandr Ovsyanik, Head of Agro-Industrial Department of Agrotrade.
Sowing is planned to be completed by October 10.
The company has also started harvesting sunflower, corn and soybeans. Traditionally, harvesting started in Kharkiv region first, as it is the southernmost in the company's geography of operations. Later, field works started in other regions. This year 17.8 thou. ha of corn, more than 8 thou. ha of sunflower and almost 5 thou. ha of soybean were sown.
Agrotrade notes that the crop year 2021 was successful for organic production, for which the company allocated 2.5 thou. ha in Kharkiv region. The crops grown include corn, sunflower, wheat, mustard, peas and buckwheat.
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"We have made much efforts in organic crop production, introduced new technological approaches, carried out tillage with advanced cultivators and changed planting dates. All of this has had an effect," adds Oleksandr Ovsyanik.
Yield increase by crops:
- wheat 15%
- mustard 32%
- peas 55%
70% of harvested by Agrotrade wheat is of food quality, and 30% is feed. The company estimated the average rapeseed yield in its fields at 2.8 t/ha. The plan for organic wheat was 3.5 t/ha.
Winter crops sowing in Ukraine as of 20 September was 17% completed. The new crop progress in Ukraine as of Sept. 16 came to 45.7 mln t of grains and legumes on 10.4 mln ha. The average yield made up 4.39 t/ha.