November 3, 2005

Ukraine to up 2005-06 corn planted area

Ukraine will likely increase the area used to plant corn in the 2005-06 season to 2.2-2.5 million hectares from 1.76 million hectares the previous season, Deputy Agrarian Policy Minister Ivan Demchak told Dow Jones Newswires late Tuesday.

The increase in corn planted area is driven by high domestic prices and seasonal weather problems disrupting winter grains planting.

According to the agriculture ministry, Ukraine harvested 5.69 million tonnes of corn to Nov 1 on 1.36 million hectares, 78 percent of the total area to be harvested.

The average yield to date was 4.18 tonnes a hectare.

On the same date last year 5.43 million tonnes of corn was harvested on 1.38 million hectares with the average yield of 3.93 tonnes a hectare.