Forces Shaping the Outlook for World Grain Markets

Abstract

After the fall of the Soviet Union, which had absorbed large parts of Ukrainian exportable surpluses in agriculture, and years of turbulences and restructuring when Ukraine had become net importer in a number of agricultural commodities, recent years saw the re-occurrence of significant Ukrainian exports of wheat, coarse grains and other products. Even though the large exports to international markets in the last two years were partly due to some specific factors, including favorable weather conditions resulting in large harvests, and the drop in exports to the Russian Federation and other countries within the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), the recent developments clearly show that Ukraine has the potential to play an important role on international agricultural markets.