The farmers warn that the agricultural sector is again hit by drought and the harvest diminished significantly. Such a message was disseminated by the president of the National Union of Agricultural Producers Associations “UniAgroProtect”Alexandru Slusari today, September 13. Asked to comment on these concerns, officials of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Industry said it is premature to draw conclusions, IPN reports.

In a message sent to the Agency’s editorial staff, Alexandru Slusari says that owing to the lack of rain, the harvest of sunflower, corn, sugar beet and soybean in almost all the districts of the country will be much beyond farmers’ expectations.

Asked by IPN to comment, the Ministry of Agriculture said the crops of the second group (corn, soybean and sugar beet) have been about 10% harvested so far. Thus, the reports about the average crop per hectare are preliminary and can change from day to day.

The sunflower has been harvested from about half of the monitored areas. The average harvest recoded so far is of 1.78 tonnes/ha, as opposed to 1.55 tonnes/ha last year.