Bad seeds
Farming in Ukraine, home to some of the world’s richest soil and great weather conditions, should be a breeze.
It should be very profitable for farmers and traders alike. It should also help feed mouths in Ukraine and abroad.
Unfortunately, due to crony state policy, farmers have had a bad taste in their mouths from planting to harvesting.
Due to misguided protectionist policies – namely export restrictions imposed last year – and murky insider dealings, it has become increasingly risky for cash-starved farmers to work.
Unsure if exports will be sanctioned and if they will be able to sell their crop to grain traders for the highest price, agribusiness has for many in Ukraine become a loss-making venture.
With such uncertainty sprouting up instead of more crops, citizens have found themselves spending more on basic foods.
It was “too little and too late” when Ukraine’s government announced this week that export quotas on grain will be lifted.
The restrictions were unnecessary in light of a reasonabe 40 million ton crop harvested last season.
The restrictions also, according to industry estimates, incurred losses of “hundreds of millions of dollars” on domestic and foreign agribusinesses that have invested billions of dollars in past years to help Ukraine reclaim its reputation as the “Breadbasket of Europe.”
Looking forward, President Viktor Yanukovych says he will sign into law duties on grain exports ranging from 9-14 percent, and lasting until January 2012.
Why is this necessary, in light of government forecasts of an even bigger harvest this year? What purpose did the recent restrictions serve?
To find the answer to why such policies exist in Ukraine that damage the interests of the majority, one needs only to follow the money trail to the murky dealings where the minority insiders close to government profit handsomely, and, according to some, corruptly.
When will Ukrainian government officials be able to clearly explain why a previously obscure quasi-state company called Khlib Investbud received a large share of export quotas when most companies were left to count losses?
Why was this company chosen to buy grain for the state reserve?
Why can’t government officials or the company identity their private shareholders?
Will it happen again?
If it does, a select few may get richer, but the nation won’t stand a chance of attracting the investment needed to realize its agribusiness potential.
It should be very profitable for farmers and traders alike. It should also help feed mouths in Ukraine and abroad.
Unfortunately, due to crony state policy, farmers have had a bad taste in their mouths from planting to harvesting.
Due to misguided protectionist policies – namely export restrictions imposed last year – and murky insider dealings, it has become increasingly risky for cash-starved farmers to work.
Unsure if exports will be sanctioned and if they will be able to sell their crop to grain traders for the highest price, agribusiness has for many in Ukraine become a loss-making venture.
With such uncertainty sprouting up instead of more crops, citizens have found themselves spending more on basic foods.
It was “too little and too late” when Ukraine’s government announced this week that export quotas on grain will be lifted.
The restrictions were unnecessary in light of a reasonabe 40 million ton crop harvested last season.
The restrictions also, according to industry estimates, incurred losses of “hundreds of millions of dollars” on domestic and foreign agribusinesses that have invested billions of dollars in past years to help Ukraine reclaim its reputation as the “Breadbasket of Europe.”
Looking forward, President Viktor Yanukovych says he will sign into law duties on grain exports ranging from 9-14 percent, and lasting until January 2012.
Why is this necessary, in light of government forecasts of an even bigger harvest this year? What purpose did the recent restrictions serve?
To find the answer to why such policies exist in Ukraine that damage the interests of the majority, one needs only to follow the money trail to the murky dealings where the minority insiders close to government profit handsomely, and, according to some, corruptly.
When will Ukrainian government officials be able to clearly explain why a previously obscure quasi-state company called Khlib Investbud received a large share of export quotas when most companies were left to count losses?
Why was this company chosen to buy grain for the state reserve?
Why can’t government officials or the company identity their private shareholders?
Will it happen again?
If it does, a select few may get richer, but the nation won’t stand a chance of attracting the investment needed to realize its agribusiness potential.
Exceedingly sad
If anyone needed more evidence of the Yanukovych administration’s descent into authoritarianism, and Prosecutor General Viktor Tshonka as one of the useful tools in the process, they got it this week.
Prosecutors charged ex-Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko on May 24 with exceeding her authority in not only negotiating natural gas deals with Russia during the 2009 crisis, but in getting a bad price to boot – costing the nation $440 million in losses.
Let’s roll back the clock to those fateful three weeks in the winter of 2009, when Russia cut off gas to Europe in another price war with Ukraine.
Had the crisis gone on any longer, parts of Europe would have been in critical danger of freezing.
Ex-President Viktor Yushchenko and current President (then opposition leader) Viktor Yanukovych were not only no-shows in solving the crisis, there was evidence they played an obstructionist role.
How so? Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin may have had them in mind when he talked about interference in the gas talks to preserve the role of controversial intermediary RosUkrEnergo, co-owned by Russia’s Gazprom and Ukrainian billionaire Dmytro Firtash.
“Today’s situation highlights the high criminalization of its authorities,” Putin said on Jan. 8, 2009. “What (they) are fighting for today is not the gas price, but a chance to keep their middlemen in order to use the dividends obtained for personal ends and personal enrichment and in order to receive financial resources needed for their future political campaigns.”
Of course, with his nemesis Yushchenko safely out of power, Putin rarely resorts to such heated words today about corruption in Ukraine.
Whether Tymoshenko reached a bad deal or a good one, she doesn’t deserve to be charged criminally.
Tymoshenko is the only Ukrainian politician who showed any leadership back then.
She got the gas flowing again and, in a great public service, she got Putin to knock out RosUkrEnergo from the gas trade between the two nations.
As for price, Yanukovych and his Party of Regions, who rode to power on promises they can broker better deals with Russia, have given away too much to the Kremlin without getting any big discounts on the price of Russian gas.
Moreover, the administration has failed to get Kremlin concessions on the pipelines that bypass Ukraine’s gas-transit network, potentially costing this nation hundreds of millions of dollars each year.
A crime? No. Incompetence? It sure looks like it.
Prosecutors charged ex-Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko on May 24 with exceeding her authority in not only negotiating natural gas deals with Russia during the 2009 crisis, but in getting a bad price to boot – costing the nation $440 million in losses.
Let’s roll back the clock to those fateful three weeks in the winter of 2009, when Russia cut off gas to Europe in another price war with Ukraine.
Had the crisis gone on any longer, parts of Europe would have been in critical danger of freezing.
Ex-President Viktor Yushchenko and current President (then opposition leader) Viktor Yanukovych were not only no-shows in solving the crisis, there was evidence they played an obstructionist role.
How so? Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin may have had them in mind when he talked about interference in the gas talks to preserve the role of controversial intermediary RosUkrEnergo, co-owned by Russia’s Gazprom and Ukrainian billionaire Dmytro Firtash.
“Today’s situation highlights the high criminalization of its authorities,” Putin said on Jan. 8, 2009. “What (they) are fighting for today is not the gas price, but a chance to keep their middlemen in order to use the dividends obtained for personal ends and personal enrichment and in order to receive financial resources needed for their future political campaigns.”
Of course, with his nemesis Yushchenko safely out of power, Putin rarely resorts to such heated words today about corruption in Ukraine.
Whether Tymoshenko reached a bad deal or a good one, she doesn’t deserve to be charged criminally.
Tymoshenko is the only Ukrainian politician who showed any leadership back then.
She got the gas flowing again and, in a great public service, she got Putin to knock out RosUkrEnergo from the gas trade between the two nations.
As for price, Yanukovych and his Party of Regions, who rode to power on promises they can broker better deals with Russia, have given away too much to the Kremlin without getting any big discounts on the price of Russian gas.
Moreover, the administration has failed to get Kremlin concessions on the pipelines that bypass Ukraine’s gas-transit network, potentially costing this nation hundreds of millions of dollars each year.
A crime? No. Incompetence? It sure looks like it.
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