Ukraine's 2025 sugar beet sowing area could fall 20%, says sugar union
Adds forecasts, details, export data
KYIV, Sept 17 (Reuters) -Ukrainian sugar beet sowing area could fall 20% in 2025 versus 2024 because of difficulties with white sugar exports, the country's national sugar producers' union said on Tuesday.
Farmers sowed around 250,000 hectares of sugar beet in 2024, the same as in 2023.
The union's head, Yana Kavushevska, told an online conference that the European Union remained the key market for Ukrainian sugar, but this market was closed for now as Ukraine's quota was filled.
EU curbs announced in April followed protests by farmers in the region who said they faced unfair competition from producers outside the bloc, including in Ukraine, who do not face the environment-related regulations and bureaucracy they do.
The Ukrainian farm ministry said last month that Ukrainian white beet sugar exports plunged to 10,300 metric tons in July after the European Union curbed the country's sugar imports.
Ukraine produced around 5 million tons of beet sugar annually in the Soviet era, but has since sharply reduced production due to export problems and competition with sugar made from cane.
In 2023, Ukraine produced 1.8 million tons of white beet sugar after farmers increased the sugar beet sowing area to 250,000 hectares from 186,000 hectares in 2022.
Ukrainian sugar refineries have already started this year's beet processing and the national sugar union said on Tuesday the 2024 white sugar production would not exceed 1.7 million metric tons.
The agriculture ministry forecast the production of around 1.55 million tons.
Ukraine, a traditional producer of white sugar from sugar beet, consumes less than 1 million tons of the commodity per year.
Reporting by Pavel Polityuk, Editing by Timothy Heritage
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