Ministry: Beetroot, sunflower fall cuts Russia’s Sept ag output

MOSCOW, Oct 21 (PRIME) -- Russia’s agricultural production slowed down in September mainly due to lower output of beetroot and sunflower and animal products, the Economic Development Ministry said in a report late on Tuesday.

The Federal State Statistics Service said that the increase of Russia’s agricultural output slowed down to 1.4% in September. It also downgraded the figure for August to a 4.1% increase from 4.4%.

“The observable slowdown of growth (to 1.4% from 4.1%) is mainly connected to the situation in the crop farming sector where the harvest of main agricultural plants, excluding grains and pulse crops, contracted below the level of the previous year. Moreover, the growth of output of animal products also slowed down in September,” the ministry said.

The statistics service said Russia’s harvest of beetroot plummeted by 31.4% on the year as of October 1, the harvest of potato fell by 11.3% as of the date, of vegetables by 0.6%, and of sunflower seeds by 7.4%, the ministry said.

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