Breaking through the blockade by ships with steel – step towards the recovery of sea exports – Metinvest

Breakthrough of the sea blockade by ships with Ukrainian iron and steel products is the first step to restore sea exports of all Ukrainian goods, according to the Metinvest group. It is stated in the company’s press release.

For the first time since the beginning of the full-scale war, three ships with the products of Ukrainian steelmakers broke through the sea blockade arranged by the aggressor country. The vessels Primus, Anna Tereza and Ocean Courtesy, which have been blocked since February 24, 2022, left the Odesa and Pivdenny ports.

The ships became the second, third and fourth that managed to leave Ukrainian ports after the termination of the grain agreement. As the company reported, they had products on board that were manufactured even before the start of the full-scale invasion – more than 76,000 tons of rolled steel produced by the Azovstal, Zaporizhstal, Kametstal, and ArcelorMittal Kryvyi Rih steel mills, as well as 172,000 tons of iron ore concentrate produced at Metinvest’s Mining. These products are now going to foreign buyers who paid for them even before the beginning of the Russian aggression.

The Ukrainian business managed to free the ships from a year and a half of captivity thanks to the joint efforts of the Office of the President, the Ministry of Infrastructure, the Navy of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and other involved law enforcement agencies.

«The breaking of the sea blockade by ships with Ukrainian steel is a historic moment, the first step towards the complete unblocking of sea exports for the entire nomenclature of domestic products: fertilizers, steel, iron ore, food, pipes, equipment, etc. And, therefore, to the accelerated recovery of the economy of Ukraine, which suffered colossal losses, in particular due to the illegal blockade of Ukrainian ports by the Russian Federation», noted the head of the project office of the general director of the Metinvest group Oleksandr Vodoviz.

According to him, the complete unblocking of ports for all types of cargo will bring the Ukrainian economy additional tens of billions of dollars in foreign exchange earnings per year and hundreds of billions of hryvnias in additional tax revenues to the state budget.

As GMK Center reported earlier, the first ship, which left Ukrainian seaports after the withdrawal of the Russian Federation from the grain agreement, became the container ship JJoseph Schulte. It left the port of Odesa on August 16. The ship was carrying more than 30,000 tons of cargo (2,114 containers), including food. The Hong Kong-flagged container ship has been in the port of Odesa since February 23, 2022. For such cases, Ukraine has created a temporary corridor for the evacuation of ships from the Ukrainian ports of Chornomorsk, Odesa and Pivdenny. Since August 15, 4 ships have already used the temporary corridor.

According to GMK Center’s research, the amount of losses from the blockade of sea ports reaches $420 million per month. Every month, Ukraine cannot produce and export 1.3 million tons of iron ore, 151,000 tons of pig iron, 192,000 tons of semi-finished products, and 218,000 tons of finished steel products.