Ukrainian cereals could be exported through Moldova

To this end, yesterday at the headquarters of the Ukrainian League of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (ULIE) was coordinated an in-person and online meeting of the Business Council Ukrainian-Moldovan focused on the possibility of using the transport system of the Republic of Moldova to solve the Logistical problems of Ukraine in the course of the conflict and, in particular, on the solutions to transfer on this system the volumes of cargo that cannot be exported through the Ukrainian ports increasing the transit of Ukrainian goods through Moldova and from there to Romanian ports or to the EU.

During the meeting it was specified that the need is to export over 20 million tons of cereals from the previous harvest you are on adding more than 30 million tons of the new harvest. Representatives of Ukrport, the association of ports Ukrainians, noted that currently the capacity of silos Moldovans are only exploited for 30% and this could partly solve the problem of storage of Ukrainian grain. "Based on the forecasts -- said the president of the ULIE, Anatoliy Kyrylovych, we may have a deficiency of warehouses and storage capacity for at least 10-15 million tons of cereals. The new harvest is beginning and meanwhile 23 million tonnes are blocked in ports and silos due to the large-scale invasion of Russia and the their cynical policy of destruction of civilian structures, of transport and other infrastructure. So far - has made known Kyrylovych - the largest volume of agricultural products exported with all modes of transport was 1.7 million of tonnes in May'.

The need to increase exports by rail and in this regard a manager of the Ukrainian railway group Ukrzaliznytsia announced that it is the first rail transport was successfully carried out through Moldova without the need to change the locomotive, thus accelerating the transport phases. The company Ukrainian railway took over in the first five months of this year a +45% increase in rail transit of Ukrainian goods through Moldova which amounted to 826 thousand tons and, in particular, the flow of cereals grew by 32 times compared to the same period in 2021.

More difficult, however, to increase the transit of goods Ukrainians on the roads of Moldovan territory, also in consideration of the queues that involve waiting for several days at the border between Moldova and Romania, queues that however are gradually shrinking.

With regard to the blockade of Ukrainian seaports, the Ukrport representatives explained that currently the ports Ukrainian rivers on the Danube have become the main gateways to exports from Ukraine, but they specified that, despite the traffic in these river ports has increased fourfold, this does not solve the problem of exports, in particular that of cereals given the need to transport at least four tonnes each month. To this end, the Ukrport representatives called on Moldova to consider the possibility of exporting Ukrainian wheat through the port international franc of Giurgiulesti which, despite being a stopover river, is the only port of Moldova reachable from the seagoing ships.