Patrushev announced the demand for agricultural products exports from Russia due to coronavirus

The degree of impact of the pandemic on the agro-industrial complex in Russia is significantly lower than in most countries of the world, said the Minister of Agriculture of the Russian Federation.

The situation with the pandemic and the spread of the new coronavirus could favorably affect the demand for Russian agricultural products abroad and increase demand for it. This was stated in the interview with TASS by Russian Minister of Agriculture Dmitry Patrushev.

""As for the situation in the Russian agro-industrial complex, the degree of impact of the pandemic is certainly significantly lower than in most countries of the world. Moreover, in this crisis we see good opportunities. Firstly, demand for our products in other countries is expected to increase," he said.

Secondly, according to the minister, a decrease in the purchasing power of the population in the world will shift consumer preferences towards relatively inexpensive products. Under these conditions, affordable Russian food products are becoming even more competitive, while world exports of high value-added products may decline, Patrushev believes.

In general, the head of the Agricultural Ministry believes that the pandemic poses serious challenges for the global economy, and consequently for the agricultural sector. "Agricultural sector has suffered equally in both well developed and developing countries. In the first case, this is due to the infection of industry’s workers, whom the authorities probably could not replace. In some cases, this led to the closure of enterprises and an increase in product prices, "he said.

According to him, in some countries, prices for finished meat products jumped sharply, but at the same time fell for the number of livestock, as the number of workers engaged in meat processing in previous capacities decreased due to coronavirus. "From our part, we tracked the situation in advance. With each region, plans were developed to create a personnel reserve for all sectors of the agro-industrial complex, which made it possible to "cover" quickly the needs of facilities, where cases of disease were identified, by workers from related industries, "the minister said.

He added that during the pandemic in developing and import-dependent countries, the main problem was the reduction of food supplies. At some point, they faced demand exceeding supply and prices rising. "Nevertheless, this situation was short-lived, and in our opinion, now the markets are returning to normal life," the head of the Ministry of Agriculture of the Russian Federation concluded.

SOURCE: Meatinfo