The EU may approve increased quotas for Ukrainian agricultural products in September

This will allow preserving the trade volumes achieved during the period of the Autonomous Trade Preferences (ATP) in 2022–2024.

In September, the EU Council will consider the updated free trade agreement with Ukraine, which provides for a significant expansion of export quotas for sensitive agricultural products. This is reported by Interfax-Ukraine.

This is expected to reduce the risk of losses of up to $800 million for Ukrainian exporters. The EU Council decision will be adopted in the version already approved by the European Commission in June, despite attempts by some countries to revise the agreements. After the vote in the Council, the document must be approved by the EU-Ukraine Association Committee.

Under the new conditions, quotas for products that form the basis of Ukrainian agricultural exports by sea will increase the most:

• wheat — by 30% (up to 1.3 million tons),

• corn — by 53% (up to 1 million tons),

• barley — by 22% (up to 450 thousand tons),

• poultry meat — by 33.3% (up to 120 thousand tons).

At the same time, quotas for processed products with high added value are significantly increasing: honey (+483%, up to 35 thousand tons), sugar (+400%, up to 100 thousand tons), powdered milk (+208%, up to 15.4 thousand tons), processed tomatoes (+150%, up to 25 thousand tons) and others.

According to Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration Taras Kachka, 21 of the 34 updated quotas exceed the actual export maximum recorded during the APR. This creates the prerequisites for the stable use of Ukrainian port infrastructure, which in 2025 remains the main channel for exporting grain and processed products to the EU.

Some quotas (in particular, for wheat, corn, honey, barley and eggs) are slightly lower than the 2024 figures, however, according to the government official, the terms of trade will allow maintaining real volumes.

As USM wrote, the share of grain going to ports by rail increased to 95% in August.