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In 2009, grain production volumes in Ukraine will total 42.9 mln tonnes (in clean weight) as opposed to 53.3 mln tonnes last year, declared the Ministry of Agrarian Policy of Ukraine. According to estimations of the Ministry, grain exports from Ukraine in 2009/10 marketing year (MY, July-June) will total 16.69 mln tonnes, as opposed to 25.2 mln tonnes in the previous MY.

Argentina, once the world’s second- largest corn exporter, lifted a ban on overseas shipments of the grain and wheat, making good on a pledge by President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner as planting shrinks.

Enabling the world's poor to feed themselves through sustainable farming will help alleviate the crises caused by one of the most urgent threats facing the world: chronic hunger and its consequences, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton says.

"This is an issue that affects all of us, because food security is about economic, environmental and national security for our individual homelands and the world," Clinton said September 26 at a food security conference co-hosted by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon during the U.N. General Assembly in New York. Representatives from 130 countries, international organizations and nongovernmental organizations attended the brief conference to address the underlying causes of global hunger.

     Mr Lytvyn said that the issue of selling land to foreigners has to be solved immediately. He said that in his opinion, simultaneously with opening the land market someone will try to legalize their actual land holdings collected illegally under the moratorium.