KYIV (Reuters) - The owner of Ukraine's major agricultural companies Kernel has warned Kyiv against prolonging its dispute with the EU over food exports, saying it risks losing the bloc's support in the war with Russia, the Financial Times reported on Wednesday.
Kernel is the world's biggest exporter of sunflower oil and large exporter of other agricultural goods. Owner Andriy Verevskyi said feuding with EU member states at such a critical time was unwise.
"I think Ukraine should not fight with Poland or other European countries over import duties and the protection of the European market," he said.
The EU curbs on Ukrainian goods announced in April followed extensive protests from farmers in the region, who said they faced unfair competition from producers outside the bloc such as Ukraine who do not face the environment-related regulations and bureaucracy they do.
"We have enough (other export) markets for Ukraine: I'm talking about India, Africa, Asia, China et cetera and I don't think we should fight and escalate the relationship between Europe and Ukraine because of agricultural supply," he said.
Verevskyi said Kyiv should accept the desire of some Eastern European countries to protect their markets from Ukrainian products, and Ukraine should "co-operate on issues more important to Ukraine".
Eastern European countries have actively supported Kyiv since the start of the Russian invasion in 2022, supplying Ukraine with weapons and taking in hundreds of thousands of refugees.
(Reporting by Pavel Polityuk; editing by Miral Fahmy)
