Good afternoon, dear colleagues, fellow Ukrainians.

Today, the agricultural sector remains one of the key sectors of the Ukrainian economy. In the first half of the year, Ukraine’s food exports totalled USD 12.4 billion.

The agricultural sector means tens of thousands of jobs. It is investments for development and taxes for the sustainability of the state.

Today, the Government supports farmers in three key areas.

The first is financial programmes. These include grants, compensation and soft loans. The second is logistics support. The third is humanitarian demining.

As part of the eRobota programme, we have launched grants to create new gardens and greenhouses. Almost UAH 1 billion of such grants have already been paid out. 2,700 hectares of new gardens have been planted. 70 hectares of new greenhouses have been laid.

Today, we are making a decision to strengthen the programme. We are expanding the list of regions for planting cherries, peaches and apricots. We are adding the possibility for winemakers to use grants to plant their own vineyards. At the same time, we are removing the condition that vineyards must be planted with an irrigation system.

Another key mechanism to support farmers is soft loans. This year, we have provided UAH 26.5 billion in loans to more than 5,600 farmers under the 5-7-9 programme.

We have also introduced a separate subsidy for farmers in the de-occupied territories. We pay UAH 8,000 per 1 hectare of cultivated land. This is an important programme that returns jobs and taxes to the communities where the fighting took place.

This year, UAH 800 million of subsidies will be paid to farmers who keep livestock. This is 14,000 farms. We are helping small and medium-sized farmers to develop a promising livestock industry.

We also have a separate subsidy to support small farms. Small farmers will be able to receive UAH 4,000 per hectare of land they farm. We have UAH 1.2 billion in the budget for this programme. The first wave of applications has already been completed, and almost 3,500 agricultural producers will receive payments. More will follow.

We continue to support land reclamation. UAH 200 million for this year. We are building and restoring reclamation systems on an area of up to 8,000 hectares. This helps to increase yields and provides additional investments from farmers themselves.

Regarding the demining of agricultural land. We have already surveyed, cleared and returned 310,000 hectares to use. This is an incredible job for which we are grateful to our deminers.

The state allocates UAH 3.5 billion for the humanitarian demining project. There are already 47 mine action operators and more than 2,200 deminers. We have 109 demining vehicles in stock and 68 more under contract. Our task is to return all farmland to use as soon as possible.

The key to logistics is the operation of the Ukrainian sea corridor. Over the 11 months of its operation, the cargo turnover in the ports of Greater Odesa totalled 60 million tonnes. Almost 41 million tonnes were exported food.

This became possible thanks to the success of our Defence Forces in the Black Sea, thanks to export support programmes, thanks to war risk insurance.

Today, we are making a decision that will allow us to attract EUR 50 million of support from the EU for the repair and development of our port infrastructure.

The dedicated work of our farmers and support from the state have allowed us to successfully conduct the third harvest during the full-scale war.

Agrarians have already harvested more than 25 million tonnes of grain. In particular, 19.5 million tonnes of wheat and 4.8 million tonnes of barley have been harvested.

Harvesting of early grains and pulses has been completed in five regions.

I am grateful to everyone who is working in the fields today, who is working to provide Ukraine with food, strengthen our economy and support global food security.

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There are several other important decisions on the agenda today that are worth mentioning.

First. We are submitting to the Parliament an agreement with France that will allow Ukraine to receive EUR 200 million in grants to restore our infrastructure and economy.

Second. We make a decision that will allow us to redistribute resources and receive an additional EUR 50 million from the EU for the reconstruction programmes of our country.

Third. We have an important decision to improve the water supply of our communities. This month we were in Donetsk region and talked a lot with people about this issue. Today, we are approving a resolution on the maximum simplification of licensing procedures and reduction of the timeframe for the implementation of projects for the construction of new artesian wells in the Donetsk region.

Fourth. The Ministry for Veterans Affairs will now have one building, which will improve the quality of its management. Given the priority of veterans’ policy for the Government, this building will be located in the centre of Kyiv at 34 Khreshchatyk Street.

We are continuing this work. We are strengthening and restoring our state. I thank everyone who works for this every day.

Thank you for your attention. Glory to Ukraine!