The impact of El Niño on Ukraine will not be significant

The Black Sea region, including Ukraine, is largely unaffected by El Niño, although this year some preliminary weather forecasts pointed to a dry summer, which poses risks for spring crops, including corn. However, given the weather in the first half of the summer, there are no significant risks for corn production in Ukraine.

This was stated by the head of the Black Sea agrarian markets department, editor of the Argus AgriMarkets publication Victoria Blazhko, Latifundist.com reported.

“Wheat production in Ukraine is also expected to remain close to last year’s levels, despite the decline in acreage, due to good weather conditions in spring and June, which had a positive impact on yields. Thus, according to forecasts, Ukraine will have a significant wheat export potential this season, which is extremely important for the global market given the prospects for lower production in several other exporting countries, such as Australia and Canada, and risks to domestic production in South Asia,” predicted Victoria Blazhko.

Prometheus also agrees that the impact of El Niño on Ukraine will not be significant.

“For Ukraine, the El Niño phenomenon will not be very noticeable. According to meteorologists, we can only expect a warmer autumn than usual,” says Vitaliy Goncharuk, a specialist analyst for commodity market research at Prometheus Group.

For reference:

Recently, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) announced the beginning of El Niño. This phenomenon consists in a sharp increase in the temperature (by 5-9 °C) of the surface water layer in the eastern Pacific Ocean (in the tropical and central parts) over an area of about 10 million km².

According to WMO, there is a 90% chance that this phenomenon will continue in the second half of 2023. It is expected to be of moderate severity. New temperature records are expected to be set and extreme heat is expected to increase in many parts of the world and in the ocean.

Tags: Ukraine, grain, wheat