June 13 2006, 12:42

Cucumber harvest is again under threat in the largest "cannery" region of Ukraine

According to information provided to "Agrooglyad: Vegetables and Fruits" journal by Roman Salo, the Coordinator of Zakarpattya office, Agricultural Marketing Project, cucumber producers have been facing problems during cucumber vegetation for the third year already. Cucumber is a strategic raw material for numerous canneries in the region.

The expert says, vegetation was delayed by unusually low night temperatures and hail-injuries. Some cucumber plantings just died. And, on this background the cucumber disease incidence is observed. According to preliminary estimations, if the situation is not better soon, Zakarpattya producers can lose 30 and more percent of cucumber harvest this year.

We'll remind that cucumber harvest has been significantly lower than expected in Zakarpattya for two years already because of hail injuries or unfavorable weather conditions. In this region more than 10 large canneries are working; they had to purchase cucumber in the neighboring oblasts and even import cucumber preserves from India. Tomatoes for pickling are brought to Zakarpattya from southern Odesa, Kherson and Mykolaiv oblasts. It seems like the situation is going to repeat this year. The canneries can load their capacities not more than 60% even if cucumber harvest is good. Otherwise they will have to purchase even larger shipments of imported raw materials.