10/10/2002 (Financial Times) - Ukrainian oil mills reduced year-on-yearproduction in the first eight months of 2002, the Agriculture Ministry'sfood department reported.Production of sunflower oil was down 14% to 351,393 tonnes.Ukrainian companies produced 8,199 tonnes of sunflower oil in August, down6.15% year-on-year and 75.5% from July 2002.Experts attribute the drop to a 35% decline in the sunflower harvest to2.245 million tonnes in 2001.Oil mills are already processing sunflower seeds from the new harvest. Themills have the capacity to process 3.5 million tonnes of sunflower seed ayear.The Ukrainian sunflower oil market is estimated at 450,000 tonnes a year.Margarine production dropped 2.6% in the first eight months to 107,554tonnes.Ukraine produced 8,261 tonnes of margarine in August, up 34% year-on-year, but down 30.3% from July 2002.Margarine production totaled 185,600 tonnes in 2001, up 22.2% from 2000.The capacity of the margarine market in Ukraine is estimated at 130,000tonnes a year.Ukraine produced 29,800 tonnes of mayonnaise in the first eight months,down 4.7%. Mayonnaise output in August amounted to 3,158 tonnes, up 9.6%year-on-year. Ukraine produced 47,461 tonnes of mayonnaise in 2001, up14.1% from 2000. The country's biggest oils and fats producers are part ofthe Ukroliyarprom association.