​Ukraine has not violated any agreement by deepening the Bastroe Canal from the Danube to increase food exports from its river ports, and is ready to demonstrate the activity to Romania, Ukraine’s Deputy Minister of Infrastructure said on Wednesday. Yuriy Vaskova, quoted by Reuters. The clarifications came in the context of Bucharest asking Kyiv to immediately stop dredging work on Bastro, unless it is aimed exclusively at maintaining the waterway, and requesting emergency access to the area to check what work has been done.

This week, Romania expressed concern that Ukraine may have been dredging a canal that affects a shared, ecologically sensitive coastal area, and asked for an opportunity to inspect the area. Ukraine, which was invaded by Russia a year ago, announced last week that the draft for ships passing through the Bastro Canal had been deepened from 3.9 meters to 6.5 meters.

Romania has announced that it is concerned about any work being carried out on a shipping channel through the general area of ​​the Danube Delta that could threaten the wildlife of the UNESCO World Heritage site and violate international environmental agreements.

This is not a new construction, but an operational deepening

• “We officially informed the Romanian side in August 2022 that we will carry out dredging operations, such as removing sediments, and we have not received any comments,” Vaskov told Reuters in an interview.

In the mid-1990s, the channel depth was 6.5 meters, but in recent years, dredging work has not been carried out in Ukraine, which has led to the accumulation of alluvium.

• “We don’t see any problem – this is not a new construction, but an operational dredging,” said Vaskov, adding that the dredging works are designed to maintain the depth of the channel for the passage of ships with a draft of up to 6.5 meters.

Ukraine transports grain through the Bastro Canal as it develops alternative routes for its export, while access to Black Sea ports has been restricted since the Russian invasion.

• “Before, it was not necessary to increase the depth (of the channel). Now there is such a need,” a Ukrainian official also explained to Reuters, reports Agerpres.

“Here, Romania did not agree”

According to him, the main reasons for this decision are traffic jams in the Danube ports and long queues on the Romanian Sulin canal.

Ukraine, which has significantly increased its exports through Danube ports to 1.5 million tonnes a month since the Russian invasion, hopes the deeper channel will allow it to export an additional 500,000 tonnes each month.

Previously, a plan was developed in Ukraine to deepen the channel to 8.2-8.3 meters, which can be implemented in the future.

• “There has been such a project for many years, but at the moment it is not being implemented. Here, Romania did not agree with the implementation of the project.
• This is in the economic interests of Ukraine and necessary in the medium term, but discussions are still ongoing. Any action can be taken when there is an agreement with Romania,” the Ukrainian official added.

Romania is an important economic partner of Ukraine, and last year exporters transported 8.6 million tons of Ukrainian grain through the Romanian port of Constanta on the Black Sea, Reuters notes.

Although the 2022 harvest has fallen to about 54 million tonnes from a record 86 million tonnes in 2021, at least 30 million tonnes of grain are still in silos and could be exported, according to the Ministry of Agriculture.

As of February 20, 2023, grain exports from Ukraine, a major global producer and exporter, fell by 28.7% to 30.3 million tons in the 2022/2023 agricultural season due to logistical difficulties and a lower harvest caused by the Russian invasion.

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