China boosts imports of Ukrainian barley

14 Sep 2020, 11:27

KYIV, Sept 14 (Reuters) - China has boosted imports of Ukrainian barley in the first two months in the 2020/21 season, buying 1.3 million tonnes compared with 659,000 tonnes in the same period in 2019/20, the APK-Inform consultancy said on Monday.

It said China had bought 862,000 tonnes of barley in August versus 415,000 tonnes in August 2019.

Ukraine is a traditional grower of barley and its traditional market is Saudi Arabia.

This season its barley exports to Saudi Arabia fell to 334,000 tonnes from 388,000 a season earlier.

Ukraine is likely to cut its barley harvest to 7.3 million tonnes this year from 8.9 million tonnes in 2019 due to poor weather, according to the economy ministry.

Exports in 2020/21 could fall to 3.34 million tonnes from 5.08 million tonnes in 2019/20, the ministry has said. (Reporting by Pavel Polityuk; editing by Jason Neely)