Export of vegetable oils from Russia will decrease in 2024/25 due to a significant crop failure.

In the 2023/24 season, Russia exported approximately 7.2 million tons of various vegetable oils. Of these, 5.2 million tons were sunflower oil, 1.2 million tons were rapeseed oil, and 757 thousand tons were soybean oil (source). As a result of this season, Russia ranks third as an exporter of vegetable oils in the world market, with an 8% share, trailing Indonesia and Malaysia, which are the main suppliers of palm oil. However, Russia remains the leader in the total volume of exports of sunflower, rapeseed, and soybean oils, with domestic products accounting for 20%, emphasized Mikhail Maltsev, the Executive Director of the Oil Production Union.

In an interview with the "Agroinvestor" magazine, Mikhail Maltsev previously noted that such export indicators were expected, thanks to the record harvest of the previous year and the processing of accumulated large carry-over raw material stocks, which allowed to increase oil production and, ultimately, increase their exports by 10%. The further dynamics of oil exports will depend on the gross collection of oilseeds in the current year and the uniform sales of raw materials by agricultural producers, Maltsev pointed out.

In the 2024/25 season, vegetable oil exports will undoubtedly be lower than the previous year, as a significant reduction in oilseeds harvest is expected, reports Vladimir Petrichenko, the general director of the analytical company "ProZerno." Stocks of oilseeds in 2023 were very low. For example, in August, experts forecasted a sunflower harvest at the level of 15 million tons, but this estimate will be revised shortly. Petrichenko notes that the reduction in sunflower oil production to 15 million tons from 17.3 million tons is a very significant decrease, and, accordingly, the production of sunflower oil and its export potential will be lower than in the previous season.

According to the analytical center "Grain Price," by September 20, 2.1 million hectares or 22% of the areas sown with sunflowers had been harvested. Yield in the Southern region has decreased from 25 centners per hectare to 17 centners per hectare, in the Central region from 27 to 23 centners per hectare. At the moment, the yield indicator in the Volga region remains at the level of the previous year - 14.4 centners per hectare. As for soybeans, as of the specified date, 1.7 million hectares had been harvested, which is 40% of the sown areas. Soybean yield at that time was 17.8 centners per hectare compared to 21.1 centners per hectare the previous year. The gross collection of rapeseed by September 20 amounted to 3.25 million tons compared to 2.96 million tons in the previous year. At the moment, 1.5 million hectares had been harvested, which is 56% of the sown areas.