In a speech to the Russian parliament earlier this year, Russian president Vladimir Putin said food exports from Russia to international markets were on course to exceed food imports by 2022.

For 2017, Russian food exports reached a record $19bn and the country’s agriculture ministry has set a target of $40bn for food exports by 2025. However, Russian exports are heavily weighted towards bulk shipments of wheat and other crops. The country is not self-sufficient in meat and dairy and still relies on imports to feed its 144m people.

Whether the country achieves its $40bn export target remains to be seen but what has always been evident is Russia’s agricultural potential.

With 123m hectares (305m acres) of the land in the country deemed arable, Russia ranks third in the world in terms of productive farmland behind the US and India. However, just over a third of this arable land (36%), or 44.4m hectares, is actually planted in cereals, meaning the country has significant headroom to increase crop production in the years ahead.

One sector where Russia is the undisputed world champion is in growing wheat. In many of the Russian oblasts (provinces), the cropping option for farmers due to the harsh winter climate is wheat, wheat and more wheat.

In the 2016/17 growing season, Russia produced a bumper wheat harvest of close to 79m tonnes thanks to record crop yields. For the 2017/18 season, wheat production is forecast at 78m tonnes.

The phenomenal growth in wheat production has seen Russia emerge as the dominant force in wheat export markets in recent years, shipping more than 38m tonnes on to the world market last year.

Outside of wheat, barley is also widely grown by Russian farmers with 20m tonnes produced last year. Maize is also widely grown, with 13m tonnes produced last year. Sunflowers, sugar beet, potatoes, oats and rapeseed are also major crops in Russia.

When it comes to livestock, Russia falls down the world rankings somewhat. Although it produced 1.3m tonnes of beef last year, Russia still imported more than 500,000t of beef last year, while pork imports reached 375,000t.

On the dairy side, Russian dairy farms produced just over 30bn litres last year. However, the country remains a net importer of dairy commodities with 115,000t of butter and 230,000t of cheese imported last year.

Read More

Wheat caught in strong weather market