Kazakhstan has always depended on petroleum to keep money coming in, but right now it’s going through a “mini-yellow gold rush.” Kazakhstan has seen a dramatic increase in the production and exports of sunflower oil this year as a result of the global supply constraints and rising prices brought on by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Eurasianet reports.
Last year, Ukraine exported sunflower oil worth billions of euros, making it the top exporter in the world. However, the conflict has affected transportation, manufacturing, and agriculture.
Fears of shortages were brought to light last week when a Russian kamikaze drone attack burned tanks of sunflower oil at the Ukrainian port of Mykolaiv. Oil from the damaged containers began spilling into the city streets.
Kazakhstan is one of the nations stepping up to fill the gap as Ukraine’s exports of sunflower oil are expected to drastically decline this year. Compared to the same period last year, exports increased by 158 percent in the first seven months of this year, while output increased by 37%.
The amounts from Kazakhstan, however, are negligible when compared to Ukraine’s pre-war productivity and exports.
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Ukraine supplied roughly half of global exports and produced about one-third of the sunflower oil used worldwide before the war.
In the 2022–2023 marketing year, the USDA projects that its proportion of worldwide output would drop to 21% and that of exports will rise to 35%.
In Kazakhstan, output increased from 195,600 metric tons in the prior year to 267,700 tons in the first seven months of 2022. In January through July, exports totaled 129,500 metric tons, up from 50,200 metric tons during the same time in 2017.
That amounts to a very small portion of the 20 million metric tons that the entire globe consumed in the 2021–2022 marketing year.
The growth in exports occurred despite Astana’s export limits on sunflower oil and seeds, which were put in place to protect domestic supply and control pricing. However, Energyprom.kz claimed that by September, the cost of sunflower oil on the domestic market had increased by 15% from the year’s beginning.
