"Higher prices spur expansion in area planted in Eastern Europe - output on the rise"
11 September 2008, Paris
http://www.fao.org/newsroom/en/news/2008/1000919/index.html
Agricultural output is expected to increase significantly in the Russian Federation and Ukraine this year, as higher food prices have led to an expansion in area planted in cereals, FAO said at a meeting here today.
Yields are also up in the two countries, and the UN agency predicts bumper cereal crops in 2008.
According to FAO’s latest forecast, this potential is already beginning to be realized, with aggregate output of wheat in the European CIS countries in 2008 set to rise to more than 73 million tonnes, 13 percent above the good harvest of 2007.
This reflects good growing conditions in Russia and Ukraine, the region’s two largest agricultural producers, and expansion in the area sown with wheat in the region, which is estimated to have increased by 2.4 million hectares to 33.8 million hectares.
In Russia alone, aggregate grain area (wheat, coarse grains, rice) for the 2008 harvest is forecast at nearly 46 million hectares – 2.6 million hectares more than in 2007, according to FAO’s July Crop Prospects report.