MINSK, 26 July (BelTA) – Vice Premier Leonid Zayats delivered a detailed report on the progress in harvesting at the conference hosted by Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko on 26 July, BelTA has learned.
“The condition of crops is generally good; 220 hectares of crops have fallen, but they can still be harvested by mechanized means. There are 7,508 grain harvesters and 2,028 grain drying complexes in agricultural organizations across the country that can perform crop harvesting and primary processing. Today, 98% of grain harvesters are ready for operation,” the deputy prime minister noted.
He also touched upon the availability of transportation means. “More than 8,600 trucks are needed for grain transportation, while only some 7,800 vehicles are available. The missing number of vehicles is provided through decisions of regional administrations,” he continued.
Leonid Zayats spoke in detail about efforts to address personnel issues during harvesting, availability of diesel fuel, as well as financial issues. According to him, as of 26 July, cereals and legumes were harvested on the area of 184,300 hectares, or 8.6% of the area under these crops. Some 740,800 tonnes were threshed, with the yield at 40.2 centners per hectare.
As the deputy prime minister said, the bunker-weight gross grain harvest is expected at 9.2 million tonnes, and if rapeseed is added, the aggregate figure will make 10 million tonnes. “Having such a harvest, we will be able to set aside 800,000 tonnes for seeds, to use over 7.8 million tonnes as feed (while the demand stands at about 6.5 million tonnes). Some 911,000 tonnes will be used to execute public procurement orders and 203,000 tonnes are to be returned to the reserves of the regions,” Leonid Zayats noted.
