Russia Has Seized 15 Million Tonnes of Ukrainian Grain Since 2022
Ukraine has accused Russia of stealing approximately 15 million tonnes of grain from occupied Ukrainian territories since the beginning of the full-scale invasion in 2022.
The Gaze reports this, referring to Reuters.
Taras Vysotskiy, Ukraine’s Deputy Economy Minister, told Reuters that the grain was systematically looted over the course of three harvesting seasons. “Taking this season into account, we estimate that Russia has stolen 15 million tons of Ukrainian grain since the start of the full-scale war,” he said.
Ukrainian authorities assert that grain produced in the occupied regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, Kherson, and Crimea is being seized and mixed with Russian grain at Black Sea ports to obscure its origin before being exported abroad.
Once blended, grain traders say the wheat becomes virtually untraceable. Kyiv is preparing to call on its Western partners to impose sanctions on companies and countries importing this illegally obtained grain.
Although Russia’s Ministry of Agriculture claims that the four occupied regions contributed around 3% of Russia’s total grain output last year, other federal bodies such as Rosstat omit these territories from official harvest data, raising further questions about the legality of the exports.
In the Luhansk region alone, Russian-installed authorities plan to harvest up to 1 million tonnes of grain this season, much of it expected to be exported. For comparison, the region produced approximately 1.3 million tonnes of grain before it was occupied.
Ukrainian intelligence has been closely tracking the flow of stolen grain. Officials believe the theft has been instrumental in helping Russia mitigate the impact of its own poor harvests, particularly in the south, which saw a 14% drop last year due to adverse weather.
This is not the first time Russia has been accused of exploiting Ukrainian grain. Previous reports have estimated the total value of stolen grain to exceed $1 billion, with thousands of tonnes taken from cities like Mariupol.
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