German agriculture minister says grain quotas "unjustified".
Restrictions on grain exports imposed by Russia and Ukraine after worse-than-expected harvests last year came in for criticism at an agriculture forum in Germany on Jan. 21.
Ilse Aigner, the German food and agriculture minister, said the restrictions were “not justified” and caused “serious alarm.”
Franz-Georg von Busse from the Committee on Eastern European Economic Relations raised concerns about the non-transparent system Ukraine used for allocating quotas, saying: “I do not understand why some companies receive quotas and [others] not.”
Ukraine recently extended quotas on grain exports to the end of March. German-based grain trading giant Toepfer International didn’t receive any allocation during the latest distribution of quotas, which was criticized by the American Chamber of Commerce in Ukraine, a leading business association, as lacking transparency.
Ukraine’s agriculture minister said on Jan. 19 that the government could expand grain quotas by allowing new allocations, according to news agency Interfax-Ukraine.
