Ukraine-EU agricultural products turnover grew by almost $800 mln last year

"As of January-November 2018, the foreign trade turnover of agricultural and food products between Ukraine and the EU countries increased by $778.6 million and totaled $8.01 billion. Ukrainian agricultural exports to the European Union increased by $362.3 million and reached $5.6 billion," said Deputy Agrarian Policy and Food Minister of Ukraine Olha Trofimtseva, the Ministry’s press service reports.

The deputy minister named five EU countries, which have been the biggest trade partners of Ukraine in the agricultural sector for several years in a row: the Netherlands (which imported Ukrainian agricultural products to the tune of $995.3 million for 11 months of 2018), Poland ($602.1 million), Germany ($584.2 million), Spain ($882.6 million), Italy ($669.5 million).

"If you look at the commodity pattern of our agricultural and food exports to the EU markets, you can distinguish five key items, which contributed to the growth in 2018. These are corn, rapeseeds, meat and edible poultry offal, wheat, dehydrated vegetables and beans," Trofimtseva noted.

She emphasized that the import of agricultural products from the EU countries into Ukraine also showed an increase in 11 months of 2018 compared to the same period last year. The imports grew by 20.6% and reached $2.4 billion. Ukraine’s top imports from the EU included chocolate and cocoa bean products, tobacco and tobacco products, fodder, meat and offal, and alcoholic beverages.