Official sees Russian annual grain harvest at 115 mln tns until 2020

BARNAUL, Jul 15 (PRIME) -- Russia’s annual grain harvest is likely to stand at 115 million tonnes annually until 2020, Pyotr Chekmaryov, head of the Agriculture Ministry’s plant breeding department, said during a conference on Friday.

“We will likely harvest 115 million tonnes each year until 2020. The area under crops stands at about 50 million hectares and productivity of land may amount to three tonnes per hectare,” Chekmaryov said.

Agriculture Minister Alexander Tkachyov said that Russian agricultural companies need to buy no less than 20,000–30,000 units of farm machinery annually.

“At present, about 600,000 tractors and combines are operating in the fields, the bulk of which wore 10 years ago,” Tkachyov said.

According to a ministry’s latest forecast, Russia will harvest up to 111.5 million tonnes of grain in 2017, 113 million tonnes of grain in 2018 and 116 million tonnes of grain in 2019.The authority estimated Russia’s 2016 grain harvest at 106–110 million tonnes.

Earlier Tkachyov said that the ministry wants to increase grain harvest to 120 million tonnes annually by 2020.

On Thursday, Industry and Trade Minister Denis Manturov said that the country’s output of farm machinery is expected to rise by 30% in 2016 with the help of state support and farm machinery sales will exceed 17,000 units this year.

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