Named sectors in the Russian agro-industrial complex, which were most affected by sanctions

Seed production and agricultural machinery in the Russian agro-industrial complex suffer most from the sanctions of Western countries against Russia, imposed because of its military operation in Ukraine. Dmitry Rylko, Director General of the Institute for Agricultural Market Studies (IKAR), spoke about this in an interview with RIA Novosti.

According to him, it is problematic to replace imported equipment in a number of areas in the foreseeable future. “Of course, there is Russian equipment, but not of the best quality, and for a number of positions it itself is in some cases completed from imported components,” the expert quotes PRIME.

He noted that the situation is similar for seeds of certain crops, and it takes years of effective work to completely overcome dependence on imports. Another thing is that it is impossible to clearly define where the domestic selection ends and the imported selection begins.

“We have to import clean lines regularly. And this is how seed growers around the world work,” Rylko emphasized. At the same time, he added that there are good seed-growing reserves, for example, for Russian varieties of winter and spring wheat.

At the same time, the expert expects that prices for Russian export products will rise. “We hope that prices for our export products will also rise,” Rylko said.

Earlier, on March 18, the head of the Ministry of Agriculture of the Russian Federation Dmitry Patrushev assured that Russia had long been fully self-sufficient in the main types of food – grain, meat, fish, sugar, vegetable oil.

Recall that on February 21, 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed decrees recognizing the independence of the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics (DPR and LPR), and on February 24 he made an emergency appeal to the Russians and announced a special military operation in Donbass. In his speech, he stated that “circumstances require decisive action from Russia” and stressed that “Russia will not allow Ukraine to have nuclear weapons.”

In response to Russia’s actions, Western countries (USA, Canada, European Union, Great Britain, Japan) announced new, tougher sanctions against the Russian Federation, including financial and economic ones.

Thus, in particular, Russian banks fell under the sanctions, including Sberbank, VTB, Novikombank, FC Otkritie and Sovcombank, and for a number of state-owned companies it was difficult to attract foreign capital.

Later, the EU countries and the United States agreed to disconnect Russian banks that fell under sanctions from the international system of interbank transactions and information exchange SWIFT. In addition, it was decided to freeze the assets of the Bank of Russia, which will create difficulties for its use of international reserves. EU countries also pledged to take steps to limit the sale of citizenship — the so-called “golden passports” that allow wealthy Russians connected to the Russian government to become citizens of EU states and gain access to their financial systems. In addition, the European Union, the United States, Canada and a number of other countries have closed the sky for Russian aircraft.

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