The Ukrainian agricultural community calls on the EU to introduce subsidies for the transportation of Ukrainian agricultural products to European ports

The All-Ukrainian Public Organization «Ukrainian Agrarian Confederation» together with the leading agrarian associations that are part of the PU “Ukrainian National Agrarian Forum” - the Public Union “Agrarian Union of Ukraine”, the Public Union “All-Ukrainian Agrarian Council”, the Association «Poultry Union of Ukraine», the Association “Ukrainian Club of the Agrarian Business” appealed to the Executive Vice-President, Trade Commissioner of the European Commission, Valdis Dombrovskis, with a request to support the initiative to introduce subsidies by the European Commission for transportation of Ukrainian agricultural products to the ports of the Baltic countries, Germany, the Netherlands, Croatia, Italy and Slovenia.

The open appeal states that in connection with the suspension of the Black Sea Grain Initiative due to the actions of the Russian Federation and the impossibility of exporting agricultural products from the seaports of Ukraine, it is necessary to urgently increase the export capacity via EU Solidarity Lanes by 1-1.5 million tons of grain every month.

One of the important directions of increasing export capacity is the increase in the volume of transportation to EU ports, which are not used enough within the "EU-Ukraine Solidarity Lanes". These are the ports of the Baltic states (Klaipeda, Liepaja, Ventspils, Riga), Germany (Rostok, Hamburg), the Netherlands (Rotterdam), Croatia (Rijeka), Italy (Trieste), Slovenia (Koper).

"The main obstacle to the full use of the mentioned directions and ports is the high cost of transportation compared to other nearby ports, in particular, Poland, Romania and Bulgaria, which makes a difference of 30-40 euros/t. Such a situation creates an uneven load on the existing port infrastructure of the EU countries," the appeal said.

Taking into account the above, representatives of the agricultural community of Ukraine call on the European Union to consider the possibility of reducing the cost of transporting Ukrainian agricultural products to the ports of the Baltic countries, Germany, the Netherlands, Croatia, Italy and Slovenia by introducing European Commission subsidies for such transportation to compensate for additional logistics costs.

We also urge the EU to consider the possibility of simplifying and speeding up the relevant control procedures during the transit of agricultural products, in particular by transferring sanitary, phytosanitary and veterinary control from checkpoints with Ukraine to the territory of the destination country, which will ensure a significant increase in export volumes.

We thank the European Union for the comprehensive support of our country in the conditions of Russia's military aggression against Ukraine and hope for the European Commission's understanding and support of this initiative.

IC UAC