KYIV, July 19 – Ukraine may gather 2.70 million tons of sunflower seeds this year, almost the same as the country's bumper crop of 2.75 million tons in 1999, a senior agricultural official said on Wednesday.
Leonid Svatkov, head of the ministry's food industry department, said the higher forecast was based on favorable weather conditions in almost all regions. The government's earlier forecast was 2.50 million tons.
"The prospects are perfect and the crop is likely to total 2.70 million tons," Svatkov told a news conference. Farms had sown 2.888 million hectares to sunflowers this year and the planted area was another reason for the good crop.
Last year the ministry said it would reduce the area under sunflowers to 2.0-2.2 million hectares from 2.86 million due to the poor quality of seeds to be sown. It also wanted to protect the country's soil, which is quickly exhausted by sunflowers.
Svatkov said Ukraine produced about 950,000 tons of sunoil from last year's crop and the industry might increase sunoil output to one million tons in 2000/2001. Ukraine exported about 350,000 tons of its sunoil.
