The plans of the Ministry of Agrarian Policy to sow 8,000 hectares of industrial hemp in 2025 will probably not be fulfilled. This is indicated by both the data of the agency itself and the problems of the industry, identified by specialized organizations, said in the material Dengi.ua .
Ministry of Agrarian Policy, in response to an inquiry, reported that as of May 21, 2025, in the Register created by the Department "eKonopli" included 38 companies that grow industrial hemp. Of these, 14 submitted data on the actual area of sowing of this crop - a total of 844.4 hectares. At the same time, on May 27, Minagro stated that 27 companies registered 3,258 hectares of planned cultivation area, of which 1,251 hectares were realized. This is significantly less than the 8,000 hectares estimated to be sown this year.
Among the main reasons for the unfulfilled plans of Minagro, the founder and head of the board of the Ukrainian Hemp Association (UHA) Oleksandr Chizhov calls the law of August 16, 2024, which regulates the circulation of hemp for industrial, medical purposes, scientific and scientific-technical activities. According to him, although licensing for growing industrial hemp is no longer required, the Registry "єCannabis" created due to this regulatory act has become a source of additional difficulties.
The program is not synchronized with land registries, so farmers have to manually enter data on numerous plots. However, this process is complicated by technical problems in "eKonopli", where the entered information can disappear. And according to the law of August 16, 2024, the cultivation of industrial hemp is allowed only on the land available in the Register. Therefore, for agrarians, the malfunctions in "hemp" significantly slowed down the process of sowing plants.
The head of the UCA also noted that many lands were already prepared for growing industrial hemp, but after the appearance of the Registry, agrarians had to sow plants on sites unforeseen for this purpose. Accordingly, many refused to do it. In turn, the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Association for the Development of Flax and Hemp Growing of Ukraine (ARLCU) Vera Ulyanchenko named the lack of technology and quality agronomy, as well as the impact of hostilities, particularly in Sumy region, where most of the industrial hemp was grown, among the reasons for the slow development of the industry. According to her, agrarians also have no idea about the market for industrial hemp products, as Ukraine actually lacks equipment for its primary processing.
