UrBC, Yekaterinburg, May 18, 2018. This year’s sowing campaign took off at Sverdlovsk Region’s farms and agribusinesses, Sverdlovsk Region’s Information Policy Department refers to the constituency’s Agriculture & Food Minister Dmitri Degryarev as stating.

According to Degtyarev, 31,000 hectares of land have been used to plant crops and pulses (26,000 hectares), forage stuffs (2,000 hectares), industrial crops (2,000 hectares), and potatoes and vegetables (1,000 hectares). This means the sowing campaign is 6.4% complete at the moment.

‘We started in early May this year, which is much later than usual. The soil wasn’t ripe for planting because of the cold weather and frequent rains and snowfalls in late April. As a result, the surface was too humid for sowing and we had to wait. Once the weather conditions get good enough, we’ll be able to intensify our efforts and thus our spring sowing campaign will hopefully take place on time,’ the official said.