Ukraine Dec Grain Export Seen Down 17% Vs Nov At 1.5M Tons

MOSCOW --Ukraine's grain export in December is likely to fall 17% compared with November, to 1.5 million metric tons because of falling prices on the world grain market, national grain producers' association UZA announced Wednesday.

UZA said grain export had been slowing - from 2.8 million tons in September to 2.2 million tons in October and 1.8 million tons in November. Including the 1.5 million tons forecast in December, total grain export in July-December, the current marketing year, should amount to about 12 million tons.

Total grain export in the 2008-2009 marketing year is expected at about 23 million tons.

In the 2007-2008 marketing year Ukraine only exported 3.6 million tons of grain because of low harvest and restrictions on export imposed by the government, which expects grain harvest this year at 51 million tons in clean weight, compared with 29.3 million tons in 2007.

-By Grigori Gerenstein, contributing to Dow Jones Newswires; gerenstein@hotmail.com