By results of eleven months of 2013, imports of sausages in Ukraine has dropped by nearly 30%, and exports dropped by 13%. This information is given by the Association "Ukrainian Agribusiness Club” (UCAB).

In January-November of last year, Ukraine has imported 0.9 mln t of meat and sausage products, totaling 5.5 mln USD. Noticeably changed the geography of imports: when in 2012, half of the sausage came from Belarus, last year the sausage mainly was imported from European Union countries, such as Italy, Spain, Poland, and Slovakia.  Import from Belarus was only 13% of the total imported sausage production.

Exports of meat and sausage for eleven months of last year amounted to 1.3 mln t that in monetary value is 5.6 mln USD. So, the balance of foreign trade for meat and sausages still remains positive although is small. The main foreign markets for Ukrainian sausages are Russia (68%) and Moldova (30%).

By the State Statistics Comittee, last year Ukrainian enterprises have produced 285.7 thousand t of sausages, that is 1% less than in 2012. It should be noted that the total meat production in Ukraine for 2013 increased by 8.5%, however, as we can see, this growth did not affecte on sausage products. The largest share in the structure of production was taken by boiled sausages and frankfurters  – 65%. Their production increased by 0.4% and amounted to 185 thousand t last year.

"Meat-processing enterprises note the reduction in demand for meat and sausage products. It happens because of low purchasing power of the Ukrainian population, for whom sausages become one of the first way of savings. In addition, over recent years, consumers have been more oriented towards meat consumption. On one side, processing business has chance to buy high-quality domestic meats at affordable prices, but on the other side, lack of demand does not give them opportunity to increase production. Entering new foreign markets is also hard because it demands a lot of permits which cost significantly raises the cost of Ukrainian products on foreign markets", - said Expert of agrarian markets of UCAB Alina Zharko.