The Ministry of Agriculture of the Russian Federation plans to maintain quotas for the import of seeds until 2025 to support the development of domestic seed production.

Ministry of Agriculture of the Russian Federation, which has begun implementing quotas on the import of seeds from unfriendly countries for the year 2024, plans to maintain this measure for the year 2025.

“For the year 2025, we plan to establish quantitative restrictions on the import of certain types of agricultural plant seeds from unfriendly countries. The decision on the scale of these restrictions will be made after analyzing the domestic seed market based on the results of the harvest collection”, the department's press service reported.

As mentioned earlier, the quota for the import of seeds for several agricultural crops from unfriendly countries for 2024 is 33.1 thousand tons. According to the government decree, the quota for importing potato seeds is set at 16 thousand tons, barley - 0.6 thousand tons, corn - 5 thousand tons, including wax - 0.6 thousand tons, rapeseed (hybrids) - 2 thousand tons, sunflower (hybrids) - 7.5 thousand tons, sugar beets (hybrids) - 2 thousand tons. The quota for wheat, rye, and soybeans is zero. These quota sizes were calculated by the Ministry of Agriculture taking into account the needs of domestic seed producers and the balance of domestic seed production, imports, and exports.

In June 2023, the Government of the Russian Federation approved a list of agricultural plant seeds whose import quantity can be restricted. This list includes seeds of potatoes, wheat, rye, barley, corn, soybeans, rapeseed, sunflower, and sugar beets.

As reported earlier, the quotas are aimed at accelerating import substitution in the seed industry, which is an important component of agriculture.

“Our decisions will be based on harvest results and seed fund formation, as well as the assessment of the domestic market's need for seeds of each specific crop”, explained the Ministry of Agriculture.

“We plan to flexibly regulate the volumes of imported seeds and gradually reduce quotas over a period of three years as domestic production increases”.

Last week, at the I All-Russian Forum of Breeders and Seed Producers in Kazan, the Director of the Plant-growing Department of the Ministry of Agriculture, Roman Nekrasov, stated that quotas for the current year for some agricultural crops are filled only halfway. Domestic breeders are actively promoting their products to the market.