Ukraine's Astarta starts processing 2024 sugar beet

MOSCOW. Aug 28 (Interfax) - Astarta Holding, Ukraine's largest sugar producer began processing sugar beet from this year's harvest at its Vinnitsia region refinery, Ukrainian media reported the group as saying in a press release.

Astarta will have a total of five refineries operating this season. Two refineries in Poltava region are scheduled to start processing at the end of the week and two more will go into operation in September.

"The season has started successfully. The first plant has been put into operation and is working at full capacity. We will soon begin shipping the first batches of high-quality sugar to Ukrainian consumers. In general, our investments in the sugar segment this year aimed to improve our plants' energy efficiency. We also focused on improving staff motivation and product quality," Astarta's director of agricultural processing, Igor Rylik said in the press release.

Meanwhile, Astarta farms, which supply a significant share of the feedstock for the sugar mills, are continuing to harvest sugar beets, the total area of which is 38,000 hectares this year.

Astarta's plants are currently using in-house raw materials, but third-party farmers with whom the group works regularly will also begin supplying sugar beet for processing on September 1, the press release said.

Astarta harvested 39,000 tonnes of sugar beet in 2023, 20% more than a year earlier thanks to a record yield of 58 tonnes per hectare, up from 56 tonnes/ha in 2022. As a result, the processing season was extended to the end of January 2024, with the company producing sugar for 130 days compared to 111 days a year earlier.

Astarta increased sugar production by 34% year-on-year to 377,000 tonnes in the 2023-2024 agricultural year (which for sugar beet begins on August 1), as it increased sugar beet processing by 37% to 2.7 million tonnes. However, its market share remained unchanged at 21% in 2023.

Astarta is a vertically integrated agribusiness group that includes sugar refineries, crop farms with 220,000 ha of land, dairy farms, an oil extraction plant, elevators and a biogas complex. The company's principal shareholders are the family of its founder and CEO Viktor Ivanchik with 40.68% and Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd with 29.91%.