The pace of production and export of Belarusian cheeses to Russia will decrease in the second half of 2021 - Maxim Fasteev

For a comment, the agency turned to Maxim Fasteev, a leading analyst at Infagro.

How do you assess the dynamics of deliveries of Belarusian cheeses since the beginning of summer? Will there be further growth?

- The pace of production and export of Belarusian cheeses to the Russian Federation at the beginning of 2021 remained at high levels. In the spring, this was facilitated by the "Honest mark" initiative, before the start of which operators tried to put large volumes in the warehouse in order to reduce, thus, the cost of labeling.

In June, after the start of the first stage of labeling, it was quite expected that there was a collapse in the supply of cheese to Russia. Less products were imported over the past year only in June 2020, including from Belarus.

Now the production of "mass segment" cheeses is less profitable than the production of milk powder and butter. Therefore, it is logical to expect that the pace of production and export of Belarusian cheeses will decrease in the second half of the year.

Why has Russia reduced the delivery of skimmed milk powder and increased the delivery of whole milk powder? In your opinion, how will the import of dairy products to Russia and the CIS countries develop until the end of this year?

- Due to the increase in the supply of raw milk and the increase in the production of skimmed milk powder at our own sites, the need for importing goods to Russia is logically decreasing. The trading dynamics of recent years clearly confirms this trend. At the same time, the production of whole milk powder is a more unique procedure, there are very few enterprises specializing in this production in Russia. At the same time, they exist, for example, in Belarus. Against the background of the growth of consumer demand during the pandemic, the demand for the products of confectioners, who in most cases are buyers of whole milk powder, also increased. Hence the growth of imports of goods to the Russian Federation.