The number of vessels waiting to sail to or from Ukrainian ports has reached 120, and the time that ships are having to wait for inspections has risen to between 10 and 15 days because of insufficient numbers of inspectors, according to the Financial Times newspaper.
The CFTS portal reported this, citing the Economic Pravda publication.
According to the newspaper, the number of vessels waiting to sail to or from Ukrainian ports reached a record high of 120 at the end of last week.
According to grain research firm SovEcon, the time that ships are having to wait for inspections at a monitoring center in Istanbul has risen to between 10 and 15 days since mid-September, up from five to six days in the first six weeks of the deal.
The delays have prompted calls for more inspectors to be added to meet demand from the large number of craft using the route, the newspaper reported. According to the report, Ukraine is eager to export as much grain as possible to create space in its silos for newly harvested crops. It has grown increasingly anxious about the backlog, the newspaper wrote, citing two officials familiar with the workings of the deal.
“There is a bit of frustration in that the Ukrainians clearly would like to export as much as possible,” the newspaper quoted one of the officials as saying.
Amir Abdulla, the UN official in charge of coordinating the Black Sea grain initiative, conceded that the five teams of inspectors - which include representatives from Russia, Ukraine, Turkey and the UN - were struggling to meet the demand, the newspaper wrote.
“We basically need to get all parties to agree that we need to add inspectors,” Abdulla told the newspaper.
The people familiar with the deal - which is up for renewal next month - said Russia had been reluctant to send additional inspectors to help clear the backlog, and that has angered Ukrainian officials, the newspaper wrote.
