"Grain and Maritime days in Odessa-2019". Ukraine, Odessa
DATE
May 30, 2019

Grain & Maritime Days in Odessa-2019: through Greece to India

Source

APK-Inform

7597

 

Traditionally, annually at the end of May Odessa turns from a resort city of Ukraine into a business platform on the Black Sea coast, where representatives of the grain and maritime industries bring together from all over the world. Of course, 2019 was not an exception, and on May 30-31 the XVIII international conference "Grain & Maritime Days in Odessa" brought together more than 300 delegates from 26 countries. APK-Inform Agency and the International law firm Interlegal became the organizers of the event.

SGS Ukrainewas the Exclusive Sponsor of the event, and Petkus Group of companies— Technology Sponsor. Also, Maersk, SocTrade, COFCO International, GrainExpo OU, and the Group of companies Weight-measuring systems LLC were the sponsors of the conference. The companies Dealex, Nortrop, and Codeska acted as Partners of the conference.

The first conference day focused on the global issues — macroeconomics, the prospects of development of the global grain market in the new season, as well as the current conditions and challenges of the maritime industry. In particular, in the section "Macroeconomics" Oleg Ustenko (The Bleyzer Foundation), William H. Meyers (FAPRI), Dimitar Bogov (EBRD), Suvra Chakraborty (AMC Overseas FZE), and Viktor Sheremeta (Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Trade of Ukraine) discussed the global economic trends and macroeconomic events in Ukraine, as well as the political and economic features of business development in the country, development trends of the Ukrainian grain market, and its positions on the global market, the Ukrainian economy in terms of the global trends. In addition, foreign speakers shared their experience on how business can build international relations with the prospective consumer markets. Speaking on the sidelines of the forum, S.Chakraborty noted that the growing interest of Ukrainian agricultural traders in developing of communication with buyers of Ukrainian grains from Southeast Asia, North Africa and India became the positive trend of the conference. In the future conference projects, the organizers plan to pay more attention to more close negotiation of product suppliers and consumers.

Within frames of the second main section — "Global grain perspective" — representatives of international grain trading companies, such as Agritel International, PETKUS Technologie GmbH, EMEA S&P Global Platts, etc., announced the results of the almost completed grain season-2018/19 in the world, and shared their expectations for the new MY, as well as presented the price formation methods on the global grain market. Oleg Onischenko (SGS Ukraine) reported about the quality and phytosanitary features of soft wheat, corn and soybeans of the harvest-2018, while the representative of JSC Lithuanian Railways in Ukraine shared the experience of successful railway transportation and noted that the IX Transport corridor that connects Ukraine and Lithuania, provides the direct opportunity to enter the large-scale market of Scandinavian countries through the port of Klaipėda (State Enterprise Klaipėda State Seaport Authority).

The parallel section "International business by new rules" provided the platform for the leading lawyers of Interlegal — Marta Sverdlykivska, Daria Liashenko and Victoria Russeva, under moderation of Irina Voyevodina, Partner of Interlegal. The experts focused on the following main questions: how to restructure a business in the BEPS terms (bank account management, substance, corporate structures), where is it profitable to register a company and keep on the safe side, as well as how business can use benefits of the foreign exchange liberalization.

Also, in one of the parallel sections the experts of yacht practice of Interlegal reported the results of the expertise on purchasing of new yachts.

“Global shipping perspective” — the third main section, including such speakers as Vassilios Logothetis (Hellenic Chamber of Shipping), Paul van Eulem (MTBS), Basil Karatzas (Karatzas Marine Advisors & Co), Martin Benderson (MACN), Ruslan Osipenko (Chinese Commerce Association), Georgios Zouglis (Corinth Canal S.A.), and Nikos D. Marmatsouris (GAC Shipping SA). In addition, the experts presented such topics as the modern challenges in the maritime industry, and the major trends in development of the European ports, as well as funding of the fleet in the following 5-10 years. They discussed how the maritime industry fights against corruption through collective actions, and what is the position of Ukraine in One belt. One road. Also, they talked about the Corinth Canal, and the near future of the maritime industry. Generally, the section received rather serious "Greek" focus, which is no wonder, due to the fact that maritime transportation has always been the traditionally developed business of Greece.

The parallel panel discussion "How to shield from fraud in grain trading: challenges-2019" provided the specific legislation features. Ivanna Dorichenko (TRADAIDE), Andrey Perepelitsa, Vitalii Tolstik and Karyna Gorovaya (Interlegal), as well as Stanislav Kovaljov (Marine Insurance Services), discussed fraudulent schemes in agribusiness, cargo insurance, innovations and changes in international arbitrations (GAFTA, FOSFA, LMAA), trends in the consideration of Black Sea disputes in GAFTA, and answered the major question of how to pay back for transportation services.

 

At the end of the first information day, the organizers provided the awarding ceremony of the companies that won in the exclusive categories according to the version of the organizers of "TOP-FACE rating of the grain market and logistics", as well as the evening art auction by the company GREENLIGHT, in which one of the participants was lucky enough to become the owner of the photo-work "WHEAT" from the new project of the high-profile Ukrainian photographer Igor Gaidai “VERUM IN GRANO”.

In the evening, the organizers held the traditional BIG Grain & Maritime Dinner for the conference participants, where the delegates had the opportunity to get acquainted in a more relaxed atmosphere, as well as communicate and discuss any work-related issues.

The second day of the conference started with the section "Local shipping perspective", during which there was the panel discussion "Topical features of the Black Sea shipping". The list of panel members included Svetlana Balaban (Maersk Company), Ilias Mouzakis (Piraeus Bank), Vitaliy Smilyk (Aquavita International S.A.), Maksym Sheremet (Baywa), Alexey Remeslo (Interlegal), Gennadiy Ivanov (BPG Shipping), Alexander Sagaydak (FNI, MIMarEST, Olvia Maritime Ltd), and Dmitry Rudenko (maritime security consultant). The Partner of Interlegal, Nikolay Melnykov and the Transport expert, Maxim Gardus were the moderators of the section.

The parallel section "The future is now" focused on IT-solutions in the grain and maritime business.

 

In addition, "Local grain perspective" was the final section. Mykola Gorbachev (UGA), Vladyslav Sedyk (Phytosanitary Association of Ukraine), Oleg Nivievskyi (Kyiv School of Economics), Pavel Plotnikov (UkrTransAgro LLC and UTA Logistic LLC), Alexander Plehve (SocTrade LLC), Dmitry Bazarov and Sergiy Komlik (Group of companies Weight-measuring systems LLC) discussed the features and potential of the Ukrainian grain market, marginality of agricultural production, infrastructure and logistics issues, and its solutions, notifications and phytosanitary issues, as well as using of the computer vision technologies for identification of grain impurities. At the same time, representatives of the Ukrainian business — Vladimir Osadchuk (COFCO Agri Resources Ukraine LLC), Timur Shishlov (Risoil Ukraine), Alexander Shtefanets (Shtef Logistic LLC), Andrei Druzyaka (Grain Star International), Vadim Bikulov (JIT+), Olena Neroba (MarcoPolo Commodities S.A.) — discussed whether the world needs 100 mln tonnes of Ukrainian agricultural products, within frames of the specialized panel discussion.

 

The second information day of the conference ended with a significant time delay, due to really huge number of questions to the speakers. The participants continued discussing the topics for a long time, and it is no wonder, because the community united with the common cause, always has something to talk about.

On June 1, the GMD participants were invited to take the yacht trip in the Gulf of Odessa, where they had the opportunity to feel refreshment in good company and enjoy the beautiful sea scape. Interlegal and Agro Mafia Club offered such opportunity.

 

The three-day event ended with the traditional amateur Football tournament, which is held among professionals of the marine and transport industries — Odessa Shipping Cup.

 

It is worth noting another feature of the conference, "Grain & Maritime Days in Odessa" is not only information and networking platform for professionals and newmen in the grain and maritime industries, but it is also the education program for the younger generation, which plans to dedicate their life to the industry. So, within frames of the conference there were in second year students of the Institute of Marine Business of the Odessa National Maritime University.

 

Of course, there are many grain and logistics conferences, but Grain & Maritime Days in Odessa is the unique one — informative and sincere. Time-tested quality!

 

 

Organizers
Exclusive Sponsor
Technological sponsor
Sponsors
Sponsor of IT session
Partners
Under support
Media support
Contacts

IA APK-Inform

+38 (0562) 32-07-95 (multi-channel),

+38 (0562) 32-15-95 Irina Ozip (ext. 115) – [email protected],

Interlegal
+380 48 7037510 Alla Agbash, [email protected]

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