Ukraine, faced with its worse wheat crop in 50 years, plans to promote spring wheat planting and hopes to harvest 2.5 million tonnes of spring wheat annually, a top official was quoted on Monday as saying.
Agroperspectiva agriculture agency quoted recently-appointed Farm Minister Viktor Slauta as saying the country would increase the area sown to spring wheat to about one million hectares in the near future from 450,000 hectares in 2003.
He also said the government planned to set up a donation programme for spring wheat producers, but gave no other details.
Last year Deputy Prime Minister in charge of agriculture Ivan Kyrylenko said the increase in spring wheat area could help Ukraine compensate possible losses from the winter wheat crop.
Severe frosts in December 2002, ice on fields between January and March and drought in the May-June period killed millions of hectares of the 2003 winter crop, cutting the country's wheat output to 3.6 million tonnes from 20.5 million in 2002.
But analysts and weather experts have said that drought which affects Ukraine almost every year between April and June, could hit the spring crop causing wheat harvest losses that might exceed those of the winter wheat crops. Ukraine usually sows about six million hectares of winter wheat.