Ukrainian farmers across the country demonstrate resilience and courage every day. Despite the uncertainty and complex challenges of wartime, they keep working, developing, and investing in this critical sector. Bruslenivske farm, a women-owned agricultural business in the Vinnytsia region, is one of the vivid examples. For 20 years, the company has been growing crops, including wheat, corn, sunflowers, barley, rapeseed, and soybeans.

To improve the land cultivation processes and increase crop yields, Vira, the farm owner, investigated the best ways to modernise her agricultural equipment. Ultimately, she decided in favour of €69,690 EU4Business-EBRD Credit Line financing from OTP Leasing, one of the programme’s partner financial institutions. With these funds, the company financed a new, modern New Holland T6070 tractor, which was immediately put to use, successfully performing various fieldwork and helping achieve energy savings of over 122 GJ/year and reduce carbon emissions by almost 9 tCO2/year. The 10 per cent EU-funded investment incentive, which Vira received as part of the deal under the EU4Business-EBRD Credit Line programme, helped to lower the investment costs and redirect the saved funds to covering other pressing needs.

“Working with the EU4Business-EBRD Credit Line opened an opportunity for us to work more efficiently, faster, and increase quality, while preserving soil fertility and increasing farm productivity,” Vira highlights. “In addition, the new tractor helps us to reduce fuel costs and harmful emissions and allows us to provide high-quality land cultivation services to neighbouring farms.”

The EBRD and EU support is an effective tool to bring about changes for Ukrainian farmers, as these favourable loans with a grant component enhance innovations, modernisation efforts, job creation and market expansion beyond the borders of Ukraine while strengthening food security in the country.