Five European Union countries close to Ukraine decided, on Friday 25 August, to call for an extension until the end of 2023 of the restrictions on Ukrainian cereal imports, which expire on 15 September, announced the Polish Minister of Agriculture, Robert Telus.
These countries had already called for such an extension at the EU ‘Agriculture’ Council in July.
Following a videoconference meeting with his counterparts from Romania, Slovakia, Hungary and Bulgaria, Mr Telus said that the five countries had reached a common position on the issue. “We support an extension of the ban on imports (of Ukrainian cereals) into our countries until the end of the year”, he told the press.
At the beginning of June, the European Commission authorised these five countries to extend until 15 September their restrictive measures aimed at blocking the marketing of Ukrainian wheat, maize, rapeseed and sunflower on their territory, which, according to farmers in these countries, is causing prices on local markets to collapse.
Poland has warned that if the EU does not give the green light to an extension of the ban, it will impose them unilaterally.
Noting that these five countries are playing the game by facilitating transit to other countries, Janusz Wojciechowski, the European Commissioner for Agriculture, had said in July that he was not closing the door on extending the restrictions, depending on the size of this year’s harvest and the state of the markets in September. Kyiv and around ten EU countries have already criticised calls for these restrictions on cereal imports to continue (see EUROPE 13229/1).
In addition, Ukraine announced on August 27 that a second cargo ship, blocked in the port of Odessa, had left via a temporary corridor set up after the failure of the Black Sea grain deal. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)