MOSCOW: Low global prices are stalling Russian grain exports in the current marketing season, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Patrushev said in a newspaper interview on Tuesday, stressing that Russian grain is still in demand.
Patrushev said that Russia plans to export between 53 million metric tons and 55 million tons of grain in the marketing season that runs until July 1. Last year Russia exported 53 million tons, including 44 million tons of wheat.
“Today we really are in a phase of lower global prices. This has also been reflected in export figures. However, since August the trend has been gradually levelling out,” Patrushev, who oversees agriculture, told Izevstia newspaper in an interview.
Russian grain exports have slowed sharply in the last two seasons from a record 70 million tons in 2023/24, undermining President Vladimir Putin’s goal of increasing agricultural exports by 50percent by 2030.
Analysts and farmers point to bad weather, especially in grain-producing southern regions, rising costs of fuels and fertilizers, and export taxes introduced in 2021 to protect the domestic market as factors behind the slowdown in exports. Despite the slowdown, Russia remains the world’s largest grain exporter.
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