OREANDA-NEWS  Russia’s grain harvest this year has already set a new record, the country’s Agriculture Ministry said on Wednesday on its official Telegram channel.

“To date, 147.5 million tons in bunker weight have been harvested, with harvesting still ongoing,” the ministry announced.

Russian Agriculture Minister Dmitry Patrushev later confirmed the figure at a staff meeting of the ministry.

“We expect to reap a maximum of 150 million tons. Of course, this is an absolute success for our farmers and the Russian agriculture industry as a whole,” he stated.

The previous record had been set in 2017, when the country reaped 135.5 million tons of grain, including 86 million tons of wheat.

This year, the wheat harvest is expected to reach 100 million tons.

Patrushev recently said that Russia’s newly joined territories, the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, and Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions, would add about 5 million tons of grain per year to Russia’s overall crop.

Russia is the largest wheat exporter in the world, followed by Canada and the US. The country has already delivered about 8.3 million tons of grain to foreign markets in the 2022 agricultural year, which began on June 1. It expects to export around 50 million tons in total by July 30, 2023.