Volodymyr is a farmer from Dnipropetrovsk region. He started working in agriculture in 2003, when he co-founded the ‘Agro-Group’ enterprise with a group of like-minded people. The business cultivated almost 7,000 hectares of leased land, built a grain elevator, and began to revive the local irrigation system. Five years ago, the group split up, and each now cultivates 100-200 hectares of land. Today Volodymyr is a co-founder of a new agricultural business, Mars-Agro, which produces crops and provides services to small farms in the region, storing, processing, and shipping agricultural products.
“Before the war, we were developing very intensively...There were a lot of loans and the situation on the market led us to expect that we would reach a new level. But the war destroyed our plans and brought down the agricultural market. Prices for material and technical resources have increased, and grain prices are low...And there is no additional lending at all, because our region was in the ‘red zone.’ Now, all forces are aimed at survival.”
Ukraine’s agricultural sector is critical to the country’s economy, and to global food security. To ensure that Ukraine's farmers could continue to grow critical grain and oilseed crops despite the impacts of Russia’s full-scale invasion, USAID has provided seeds and fertilizers to more than 14,000 Ukrainian agricultural producers in 2023 and 2023 as part of the USAID Agriculture Resilience Initiative-Ukraine (AGRI-Ukraine).
“Thanks to USAID, we received fertilizers for free, and at the beginning of 2023, we received seeds. This allowed us to save money and plan our sowing” explains Volodymyr.
Despite significant challenges caused by Russia’s war, Volodymyr’s business continues to evolve.
“We have to stand. We no longer call challenges ‘problems.’ When we talk about them, smiling, we say that we have ‘new introductions’ and discuss what we will do with them further. Now we are reducing the cost of production because we do not understand what the prices for grain and logistics will be next,” says the farmer.
In the future, Volodymyr plans to create a greenhouse, and to develop services for local agricultural enterprises to store, process, and ship grain.
“Today, many farmers do not have warehouses and opportunities to weigh or load grain. We try to help, sometimes even for free. I believe that we can develop in this [direction], because there is a need for these services.”
However, Volodymyr’s main plan for the future is victory.
“Our plans for the future are to win. Restore all logistics chains and return to pre-war grain prices. We are a large agrarian country. Now, the country’s budget is mostly replenished by the agricultural sector. I believe that after victory, instantly, like a flower in the spring, agricultural production and all of Ukraine will flourish,” says Volodymyr, confidently.
USAID supports micro-, small-, and medium-sized (MSME) agricultural enterprises that produce grain and oilseeds, ensuring that they have the fertilizers, seeds, and access to storage, finance, and other tools they need to succeed. In 2023, AGRI-Ukraine provided more than 14,000 Ukrainian agricultural producers with seeds and fertilizers for work on more than 460,000 hectares and supported grain sleeve storage services to more than 1,000 agricultural producers in 10 regions of Ukraine. Next year, USAID will support Ukraine’s grain elevators to increase the volume of grain storage by more than 276,000 tons and grain drying volumes by 280,000 tons.
