EU countries have increased imports of oilseeds, but reduced purchases of meal and oil

According to the European Commission, in 2022/23 Ukraine took first place among suppliers of sunflower seeds, rapeseed, sunflower meal, sunflower and soybean oil to the EU, third place among suppliers of soybeans, rapeseed meal and oil, and fourth place among suppliers of soybean meal.

The volume of imports to the EU of the listed products from Ukraine increased compared to the previous season by 68% to 9.8 million tons. Thus, the share of Ukrainian sunflower in the total import of sunflower to the EU increased compared to the previous season from 12.7% to 85.5 %, the share of Ukrainian rapeseed - from 37.8% to 45.5%, although the share of imports of Ukrainian rapeseed oil and meal decreased somewhat.

In general, in 2022/23 MR EU countries increased the import of oil crops by 13% to 18.926 million tons compared to the previous season, and decreased the import of meal by 1% to 15.926 million tons and oil – by 19% to 5.5 million tons. This shows that supplies of cheap raw materials from Ukraine were very profitable for European processors. In addition, they allowed this thing to reduce food prices and food inflation in the EU from 9% to 6.5%.

Compared to the previous season, the import of oilseeds to EU countries in 2022/23 MR changed as follows:

• Imports of soybeans decreased by 13% to 10.06 million tons, in particular, the share of supplies from the USA increased from 33.7% to 45.5% or 4.68 million tons, from Brazil - fell from 52.1% to 32.7% or 3.36 million tons, from Ukraine - increased from 3.2% to 11.4% or 1.178 million tons;
• rapeseed imports increased by 46% to 6.536 million tons, in particular, the share of deliveries from Australia increased from 43.9% to 45.1% or 2.948 million tons, from Ukraine - from 36.5% to 45.1% or 2.948 million tons, then as from Canada decreased from 13.2% to 3.5% or 0.23 million tons;
• Sunflower imports grew by 306% to 2.095 million tons, in particular, the share of supplies from Ukraine increased from 15.5% to 84.4% or 1.79 million tons, while from Moldova decreased from 59.5% to 8.3% or 0.175 million tons.