Bolotov is a farmer and an entrepreneur from Blahodativka, a small village in the Kherson region. He had been managing his farm – an enterprise of about 150 hectares – with his father for about ten years when the Russians invaded and occupied the area in 2022. Blahodativka has been liberated alongside Kherson during the fall counteroffensive of 2022, and Bolotov – who managed to flee the region during the occupation – returned to his farm and his work.
Now, the job is more difficult than ever. The farmer’s day begins with a scan of the horizon and a check of the latest air-raid alerts – there are constant drone attacks on the territory. Bolotov is among the luckier ones – all of his farmland has been demined, but he is still picking up the remnants of enemy shells left behind on the territory.
The legacy of war and occupation
Kherson sits at the crossroads of Ukraine’s agricultural glory and its wartime devastation. Once celebrated for its yield per hectare and strategic access to Black Sea corridors, the region’s occupation and later, proximity to the frontline significantly worsened the farming opportunities. In 2022, Russian troops looted equipment, destroyed combines, stole tractors and ravaged irrigation systems. They also left behind mines, making the liberated areas extremely dangerous even after the Russian retreat.
“We had more than 150 cluster munitions detonated across our land,” says Volodymyr Tenyk, a farmer and an entrepreneur in Kherson.
“Even after de-mining and ploughing, a cultivator and another tractor later exploded in the same fields,” he adds, “Fortunately, the drivers survived.”
Nationwide, the Russian war has stripped Ukraine of farmland at an alarming scale. Estimates suggest about 2 million hectares of fertile soil remain unsafe to cultivate due to mines or contamination, with only a fraction cleared so far. Prior to full-scale war, Ukraine harvested a record 106 million tonnes of grain and industrial crops in 2021. By 2024, that figure fell to roughly 77 million tonnes — a drop of more than 25%. Much of this decline reflects inaccessible land, damaged infrastructure, and disrupted logistics.
For farmers like Bolotov and Tenyk, this is a daily reality. Fields that once brought impressive harvests – and profits – are now marked by rubble and unexploded ordnance. Even the act of putting seed in the ground is a gamble, interrupted by missile alerts and the ever-present threat of drones. And yet, the harvest — when it comes — goes on.
Harvesting for Europe
The physical courage of these farmers is matched by their logistical perseverance. After Russian forces destroyed the Kakhovka dam in 2023, farmers across southern Ukraine faced severe water shortages that cost hundreds of millions of dollars in lost crops. Satellite assessments estimated losses of nearly USD377 million in irrigated crop value due to the breach alone.
At the same time, deep economic pressures bear down. Fuel depots and storage facilities have been hit by missiles, supply chains remain fragile, and the distinctive boom of tractor engines is occasionally drowned out by air-raid sirens. The Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine notes that areas along the front line — especially in Kherson, Kharkiv and Zaporizhzhia — house much of the country’s most fertile soils, now lying fallow because of the war.
Despite these obstacles, Ukraine’s agriculture has rebounded more than many expected. By 2024, agricultural exports reached around USD23 billion, nearing pre-2022 levels. In peak months, the sector accounted for 60% of all export revenues, making it the backbone of the wartime economy and vital for foreign currency needed to purchase weapons, energy and humanitarian aid.
Whether this output persists depends on both the safety of the farmers, and their access to global markets — an arena where the European Union plays a central role.
Ukraine’s agricultural ties to the European Union have grown significantly since the full-scale war began. Historically, the EU was already Ukraine’s largest export market for crops and foodstuffs. Since 2023, roughly half of Ukraine’s agricultural exports have been absorbed by EU markets — a lifeline for Ukrainian producers such as Irina Unguryan, director of a major farm in Zhytomyr region.
“We couldn’t sell anything in the first months after the war,” she recalls, “Logistics collapsed. We simply waited, and eventually we shifted to export, selling mostly to the EU.”
These shifts reflect broader trade and political transformations. Ukraine applied for EU membership shortly after Russia’s invasion, and in late 2023 the European Council authorized the opening of accession negotiations. Integrating Ukraine’s large agricultural sector into the EU’s framework — including the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) — will be one of the most politically sensitive aspects of enlargement. The sheer scale of Ukraine’s production raises questions about budget impact, market balance and subsidy structures.
For European policymakers, supporting Ukraine’s farms is more than economic altruism. The EU’s own food security strategy recognizes Ukraine as a key contributor to European and global supply chains, especially after Russia’s blockade and the subsequent collapse of Black Sea export routes. New “solidarity lanes” — overland and riverine corridors for grain exports — were established by the EU to sustain flows of Ukrainian goods across Europe. In the view of Brussels, ensuring Ukrainian grain reaches global markets is a step toward stabilizing food systems worldwide.
At the same time, balancing this support with the concerns of European farmers has been politically delicate. In 2025, Brussels reintroduced quotas on duty-free Ukrainian wheat and barley — measures welcomed by some EU agricultural unions seeking relief from market pressure — while negotiating longer-term arrangements with Kyiv.
The Cost of Integration and the Green Transition
For Ukrainian farmers, aligning with EU rules is both an opportunity and a challenge. The Common Agricultural Policy includes environmental standards, precision fertilizer use, water management requirements and reporting mandates that demand investment. In peaceful EU countries, these shifts take years, supported by stable subsidies. In Ukraine, they must occur while the war continues and farmland is lost every month.
“European standards are correct,” says Unguryan, “We understand why they exist. But applying them in wartime requires flexibility.”
This tension is further compounded by recent disruptions in fertilizer supply. Wartime bans on seaport imports of nitrogen fertilizers — imposed for security reasons — have contributed to shortages that threaten yields of key crops like wheat, corn and barley. Ukraine’s largest farming union has warned that without access to non-explosive fertilizer imports by sea, yields could drop by up to 30% in coming seasons.
Aligning with the EU’s green transition — part of broader climate goals under the European Green Deal — means not only meeting new standards but doing so while sustaining yields in hostile conditions. This calls for innovation and investment in technologies that improve water efficiency, minimize emissions and protect soils. Some Ukrainian producers are already experimenting with conservation agriculture, but scaling such practices will require targeted support and predictable market access.
For Ukrainians, farming is about daily survival — and about feeding a nation and the world under extraordinary pressures. For Europe, Ukraine’s agriculture is both a strategic asset and a test case: can enlargement and the green transition cohere into a mutually beneficial relationship?
Brussels sees this integration as part of a broader geopolitical alignment that strengthens the EU’s Eastern flank and reinforces common standards across a space now bordering conflict. But as Unguryan puts it, “predictability matters more than promises” — farmers need guaranteed market access, transparent rules and the support necessary to invest in the future amid ongoing conflict.
Even as Brussels proclaims solidarity with Ukraine, its support for Ukrainian farmers remains ambiguous and politically constrained. Trade negotiations between Kyiv and the EU have repeatedly revealed how sensitive agricultural issues are within the bloc. In 2025, after years of duty-free access that helped Ukraine pivot its exports toward European markets, the EU re-introduced quotas on key Ukrainian agricultural products, including wheat, sugar and other staples, in an effort to calm pressure from European farmers worried about competition. These quotas — much lower than the volumes shipped in previous seasons — reflect concern that unfettered Ukrainian imports could disrupt markets for producers in France, Poland, Spain and beyond. Sandra Kalniete, rapporteur for the European Parliament’s agricultural trade file, encapsulated the dilemma when she said that while the EU “stands by Ukraine in the face of Russia’s brutal war,” it must also “protect the interests of European farmers…should they be overwhelmed by a sudden surge in Ukrainian imports.”
As part of recent provisional trade agreements, Brussels even built in an “emergency brake” that could quickly reinstate tariffs if imports of sensitive products spike — a safeguard that underscores EU leaders’ caution. This balancing act illustrates the EU’s broader ambiguity: real political support for Ukraine’s agriculture coexists with fear among EU member states that liberalized Ukrainian trade could strain domestic farming communities. This dynamic complicates both market access for Ukrainian producers and deeper agricultural integration ahead of potential EU accession.