Ukraine benefits from excellent conditions for agriculture. The country is largely flat, except for the Carpathian range in the West and the Crimean Mountains in the South. The primary weather is moderate continental, with a temperate climate and adequate rainfall. Ukraine also has an abundant supply of water, thanks to a vast river network, which includes the Dnipro, Dniester, Pripyat, Donets, Southern Bug, and Desna rivers, as well as more than 3 000 lakes, and over 1 100 artificial water reservoirs. Climatic conditions are becoming gradually warmer and drier in the southern and eastern regions, which motivated the construction of the Dnipro-Donbas canal, and of the now-destroyed Kakhovka reservoir. Ukrainian agriculture also benefits from sufficient sunlight, especially in the Black Sea basin. These factors create optimal conditions for cultivation, but it is the highly fertile soils, covering nearly two-thirds of the country, that earned Ukraine the nickname ‘the breadbasket of Europe’. Chornozem, Ukrainian for ‘black earth’, is the most fertile and common of these soils, extending through 28.3 million hectares. This dark soil is rich in organic matter, with up to 9 % of humus content, and benefits from the continental climate present in parts of central and eastern Europe, and in North America. Other fertile soils include cambisols and kastanozem. The most fertile chornozem is located primarily in the forest and steppe zones running from west to east (see Figure 1), with less fertile but still rich soils closer to the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov. Despite the high quality of Ukraine’s soils, droughts, water and wind erosion were already affecting 20 million hectares in 2020, prompting legislative initiatives to preserve soil health.
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