Sunflower oil | 31,262 tons |
Honey | 4,075 tons |
Apple juice | 123 million liters |
Hockey sticks | 173,000 |
Electric coffeemakers | 176,000 |
Pig iron | 1.1 million tons |
Here’s Jonathan Swift praising bees three centuries back: “We have chosen to fill our hives with honey and wax, thus furnishing mankind with the two noblest of things, which are sweetness and light.” And here’s Alisa Koverda, translator and apiary expert at the Ukrainian Agriculture Ministry, writing in the autumn of 2022:
“Ukraine’s honey business is one of the largest in the world. Sadly, as a result of the war, dozens of apiaries and beehives are being destroyed every week. In some cases, beekeepers are able to get some financial support from the government, but it is not enough. Yet, the beekeepers remain optimistic. They share everything they have: their honey, knowledge and optimistic spirit.”
Peacetime Ukraine is the world’s second-largest honey producer, home according to her article to 220,000 commercial beekeepers with 2.3 million colonies, and probably another 200,000 part-time unregistered part-timers. They sold 58,000 tons of honey abroad in 2021. Their top customers were neighboring Poles and Germans; Americans ranked third at 5,953 tons, making Ukraine the fifth-largest U.S. overseas honey source.
Pulling back a bit, pre-war Ukraine’s exports combined a large agricultural trade, centered on wheat — the blue and yellow flag represents the sky and a grain field — sunflower oil and seeds, honey, and processed foods such as apple juice with heavy-industry products led by iron and steel. Altogether this made up about a third of Ukrainian GDP, or $68 billion of a $200 billion as of 2021.
Three years later, exporting is more important still — together with aid and remittances, foreign customers are Ukraine’s main source of hard currency, helping to finance the war effort, keep local fire and police services functioning, and supporting the living standards of civilian workers and families. Markets abroad, though, are obviously now harder to reach. Grains, metals, and vegetable oils are bulky and heavy goods requiring sophisticated logistics and safe sea lanes to move, but Ukraine’s eastern seaports are occupied, and the Dnipro river ports near the front are free but blocked. The national export total accordingly fell from 2021’s $68 billion to $44 billion in 2022, and continued to drop through the middle of 2023. Nonetheless, through military successes, logistical innovation, help from allies, and inventive diplomacy, Ukraine’s trade absorbed the shock, began a rebound in the second half of 2023, and is now rising again.
At the core of this revival is a remarkable naval achievement. Without capital ships of its own, Ukraine has used drones, missiles, and intelligence to sink a third of the Russian Black Sea fleet’s 75 ships – the most recent example yesterday, the three-year-old 1600-ton patrol cruiser Sergey Kotov – and forced the rest to shelter out of range in the east. This has opened a “grain corridor” near the Romanian and Bulgarian coasts, allowing 23 million tons of exports to flow out of Odesa, Chornomorsk, and Pivdennyi in the second half of 2023. In February 2024, the Kyiv Independent reports 8 million tons. To the northwest, meanwhile, support from the European Union and aid programs run by the U.S. State Department and Agency for International Development have helped redirect some of Ukraine’s outbound trade through new road crossings and Danube river ports via Poland, Slovakia, and Romania. The Economy Ministry’s creative diplomacy, meanwhile, has worked out a waiver of Trump-era steel tariffs with the Biden administration, negotiated a free trade agreement with southern neighbor Turkiye, and used WTO rights and rules to battle occasional grain blockages at western-border transit points.
Altogether, having stabilized in 2023, Ukraine’s trade is now rising, with IMF projections suggesting 11% export growth this year, supporting in turn national GDP growth of 3.2%. U.S. Census figures on arriving goods provide a set of human-scale examples. Some products — sunflower seeds and steel, for example – remain sharply down. Apple juice and sunflower oil shipments, on the other hand, are now above their 2021 levels and accompanied by a steady flow of light manufactured goods: 176,000 electric coffeemakers, 132,500 pairs of skis (fourth in the world, behind Austria, China, and Bulgaria), 19,600 archery sets, and 173,000 hockey sticks (third, following China and Mexico).
Honey, too, is holding up, justifying the ‘optimistic spirit’ of late 2022. Over the course of 2023, the U.S. Census reports 4,075 tons arriving (mainly in USDA’s ‘extra light amber’ grade), valued at $11 million. December’s arrivals included 74 tons in Chicago, 38 tons in Philadelphia, and 15 tons in New York. So in the third year of war, Ms. Koverda’s beekeepers continue to provide some sweetness and light to both overseas customers and locals, and along with these things an an example of resilience and hope.
From PPI:
PPI’s New Ukraine Project, directed by Kyiv-based Tamar Jacoby, has in-depth research and regular reporting on Ukrainian daily life, public mood, economic policy and anti-corruption progress, and more.
Budget and tax expert Ben Ritz explains the low cost, and high return, of military aid to Ukraine.
Diplomacy and policy:
The Ukrainian Embassy to the U.S.
Ukraine’s Commerce Ministry.
USAID’s agricultural support programs.
48 WTO delegations on economic and trade support for Ukraine.
View from the European Union.
Black Sea:
English-language Kyiv Independent reports on the Black Sea grain corridor.
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty on Ukraine’s naval success and the retreat of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet.
… and follows up with yesterday’s sinking of the Sergey Kotov.
And Logistics Cluster reviews the status of Ukraine’s ports.
“Sweetness and light”:
Agricultural specialist and translator Alisa Koverda explains Ukraine’s beekeeping culture and wartime adaptation.
… and Фундація Жінок Пасічниць (Fundatsiya Zhinok Pasichnish’ for non-Cyrillic readers; translated, Foundation of Women Beekeepers), with honey contacts and beekeeping tips.
Ed Gresser is Vice President and Director for Trade and Global Markets at PPI.
Ed returns to PPI after working for the think tank from 2001-2011. He most recently served as the Assistant U.S. Trade Representative for Trade Policy and Economics at the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR). In this position, he led USTR’s economic research unit from 2015-2021, and chaired the 21-agency Trade Policy Staff Committee.
Ed began his career on Capitol Hill before serving USTR as Policy Advisor to USTR Charlene Barshefsky from 1998 to 2001. He then led PPI’s Trade and Global Markets Project from 2001 to 2011. After PPI, he co-founded and directed the independent think tank ProgressiveEconomy until rejoining USTR in 2015. In 2013, the Washington International Trade Association presented him with its Lighthouse Award, awarded annually to an individual or group for significant contributions to trade policy.
Ed is the author of Freedom from Want: American Liberalism and the Global Economy (2007). He has published in a variety of journals and newspapers, and his research has been cited by leading academics and international organizations including the WTO, World Bank, and International Monetary Fund. He is a graduate of Stanford University and holds a Master’s Degree in International Affairs from Columbia Universities and a certificate from the Averell Harriman Institute for Advanced Study of the Soviet Union.