Ukrainian exports of sunflower oil in October amounted to more than 400 thousand tons

In the first two months of the new season, Ukrainian companies exported 764 thsd tonnes of sunflower oil, down 20% compared to last year.

According to the customs statistics, in October 2023, Ukraine exported 407 thsd tonnes of sunflower oil, up 50 thsd tonnes compared to the previous month, but down from 454 thsd tonnes in October 2022.

In total, Ukrainian companies exported 764 thsd tonnes of sunflower oil in the first two months of 2023/24 season, compared to 963 thsd tonnes a year ago.

As a reminder, Ukraine exported 5.6 mln tonnes of sunflower oil in 2022/23 season.

The monthly export dynamics for the last two seasons is shown in the following chart:

Due to the significant decline in domestic sunseed prices after the start of the new harvest in Ukraine, we note a slight increase in its exports – in October it amounted to 30 thousand tons (compared to almost zero exports in the previous months). However, the sunseed exports are still much lower than during most of 2022 and early 2023 (recall that from April 2022 to March 2023, Ukraine exported 3.3 mln tons of sunseed).

The competition between crushers and the reluctance of Ukrainian farmers to sell sunseed at low prices, which prevailed on the market in early October, contribute to the reduction of crushing margins and restrain sunflower exports.

In 2023, according to the official data, the total sunflower area in Ukraine amounted to 5.1 mln ha, which is almost the same as in the previous year. As of November 2, the harvesting of sunflower is almost completed – as of November 2, the country harvested 11.3 mln tonnes of sunflower from 4.8 mln ha (94% of the planned area) with the average yield of 2.37 t/ha (in 2022 – 2.18 t/ha).

Tags: sunflower oil, export, prices, sunseed, Ukraine