Ukraine increased its exports by 94% in a week, but traders are worried about the formation of a queue for loading ships

During the 31st week of operation of the "grain corridor" (February 27 - March 5), 1.0216 million tons of agricultural products were exported through the sea ports of Odesa, which is 94% more than the figure of the previous week. More than 70% of this volume was corn, 20% - wheat and 4% sunflower meal. The number of loaded ships increased by 6 to 20 units, which indicates the complexity of the grain corridor. Ukrainian agricultural products went to China, Turkey, Japan, Portugal, Belgium, the Netherlands, Kenya, Yemen, Egypt and other countries in Europe, Asia and Africa.

In total, from August 1, 2022, Ukraine was able to export 23.3 million tons of agricultural products through the grain corridor.

The uptick in grain exports in February and March was expected as traders scheduled many ships to get products out before the grain deal expires. This further increased the queue for inspection of the courts, which is already artificially delayed by Russian representatives in the SCC.

To improve shipment logistics, Ukraine has introduced an electronic queue for loading ships within the grain corridor, but many traders complain that some companies' ships are loaded faster than others.

On March 7, the press service of the Prometheus company issued a statement about the corruption of the formation of an electronic queue for shipments through the grain corridor. The company believes that the employees of the Administration of Seaports of Ukraine are involved in the situation, and the "Transservice-2008" terminal is their tool or accomplice in the scheme. If necessary, the company is ready to provide the necessary evidence, and has already prepared a statement addressed to the Prosecutor General of Ukraine.

From the information received from Transservice-2008, it follows that "they do not know how the electronic queue is formed for the processing of vessels entering the terminal as part of the grain initiative," the company said.

The mechanism of the criminal scheme is as follows - one of the companies of the "Prometheus" group concludes a cargo transshipment contract with an operator that has a quota at the terminal, after which it begins to deliver the legal batch to the terminal's warehouses. However, the terminal allows someone to promptly accumulate a trial batch of products, while others refuse to do so, citing the lack of free containers, which creates a field for manipulation.

As a result, the Prometheus company does not allow the full volume of the ship's consignment to be imported, although there are no restrictions for other companies. The terminal independently determines the order of loading of vessels, which indicates manual control of the process.

"The AMPU is the organizer of the scheme, so it is necessary to strictly stop this false practice," - believes the management of the DC "Prometheus".

At a time when the Russian Federation is waging a war against Ukraine and artificially limiting the export of Ukrainian products, the domestic authorities need to develop a transparent mechanism for the entry of ships into ports so that terminals and traders can work out the logistics of supplies. Because many cases have been recorded where ships have entered ports and are waiting to stockpile and load products, while other terminals are full, but ships are not entering them.