Today, July 11, the Verkhovna Rada has been registered the Draft Law on Amendments to Chapter XXI "Final and Transitional Provisions" of the Customs Code of Ukraine regarding the exemption from import duty taxation of products and equipment for storage, transportation, loading and unloading of grain and/or oil crops. The UAC calls on the parliament to consider the draft law in the session hall as soon as possible.

"Due to the armed aggression of Russia against Ukraine, the problem of ensuring proper storage of grain arose due to the impossibility of sending it for export through sea ports, with the simultaneous occurrence of places shortage for storing agricultural products. A lot of elevators were destroyed, and the existing ones were not designed for these storage amounts – capacities for storing grain and oilseeds shortage is expected this fall – it is more than 15 million tons," was said by the UAC adviser on interaction with state authorities Dmytro Kokhan.

The way out of the current situation is a usage of temporary grain storage measures: polyethylene bags and sleeves (up to 200 tons of grain can be loaded and stored directly on the field), as well as machines (equipment) designed for their loading and unloading.

Thus, it is necessary to import a significant amount of such products to Ukraine in a short period of time, because their domestic production is actually stopped at the moment. At the same time, the import of these products is not facilitated by import duty rates, which range from 6.5% to 10% of their customs value.

That is why the experts of the Ukrainian AgriCouncil (UAC) actively participated in the development of the relevant draft law, which proposes to amend the Customs Code of Ukraine and exempt from payment of customs duties when imported into the territory of Ukraine:

Polymer bags and sleeves, intended for agricultural products storage;

• trailers and semi-trailers with self-loading or self-unloading for agricultural products transportation.
• It is important to note that this exemption does not apply to goods originating from the aggressor country.

Farmers expect the adoption of a new law, as two problems have been combined in Ukraine nowadays: blocked ports have made it impossible to export the required grain amount, and destroyed elevators have reduced the ability of farmers to gradually sell their products throughout the year.