MOSCOW, July 23. /TASS/. With foreign shipping companies now unable to enter Ukrainian ports, the country's economy will obviously suffer, particularly its agricultural sector, Alexander Dudchak, a leading researcher at the Institute of CIS Countries and an expert of the "Other Ukraine" movement, told TASS.

"Of course, agricultural producers will take a hit. Some 42 million tons of cargo were transshipped through Ukrainian ports, of which about 24 million tons were Ukrainian agricultural products. Of course, there will be problems. How can such volumes of grain be delivered to consumers overland? This is what farmers in Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania are very afraid of. Because we remember what happened in 2023, when Ukraine urged Poles not to worry and promised that grain would pass through their territory only in transit, but in fact cargo volumes settled in neighbouring countries, which hit farmers in those countries very hard. Of course, they are unlikely to welcome such a prospect there," Dudchak said.

The expert noted that recently grain terminals in Ukrainian ports have reduced their operations by about a third, and cargo transshipment volumes have begun to decline sharply. "The greatest damage is being inflicted on the export of agricultural products. Because this is the most important sector of Ukraine's economy," he emphasized.

Compared with 2012, transshipment volumes have fallen by at least half, Dudchak notes. In 2012, more than 150 million tons of cargo were transshipped through Ukraine's seaports, taking into account that at that time the ports of Crimea and the Sea of Azov, which provided a large volume of cargo, were also part of the system.

The Russian Defense Ministry had previously reported strikes on Ukrainian ports used for the delivery of military cargo to Ukrainian armed forces. The day before, the Danish shipping company Maersk announced announced it would not allow its vessels to traverse the port of Chernomorsk (Odessa region) due to elevated risks. Today, Ukraine's Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food, Taras Vysotskyi, reported that the entry of cargo vessels into the country's seaports had been suspended since July 22 by decision of carriers.