- July 18, 2026
- 12:38 pm
- Israel
By the end of the 2025/26 marketing year, Israel entered the top five largest buyers of Ukrainian wheat flour, ranked first in the import of other types of flour, and second in the purchase of Ukrainian groats and pellets. Supplies are growing against the backdrop of a general reduction in Ukrainian flour exports and Israel’s high dependence on foreign food.
Israel has significantly strengthened its position among buyers of Ukrainian grain processing products.
During the 2025/26 marketing year, Ukrainian enterprises supplied Israel with 5.2 thousand tons of wheat flour, 729 tons of other types of flour, and 6 thousand tons of groats and pellets.
The total volume of these three categories approached 12 thousand tons.
However, Israel’s position in each of them varies. Therefore, the statement that Israel has become one of the main importers of Ukrainian flour requires a more detailed explanation.
Israel entered the top five buyers of wheat flour
The total export of Ukrainian wheat flour in the 2025/26 season amounted to 60.3 thousand tons. This is 9.5% less than in the previous marketing year, when Ukraine exported 66.7 thousand tons of such products.
The largest buyer remained Moldova, which received 19.4 thousand tons — 32.2% of Ukrainian exports.
Next are:
| Country or market | Volume | Share of Ukrainian exports |
|---|---|---|
| Moldova | 19.4 thousand tons | 32,2% |
| “Palestine” | 10.2 thousand tons | 16,9% |
| Czech Republic | 9.5 thousand tons | 15,7% |
| Spain | 6.1 thousand tons | 10,1% |
| Israel | 5.2 thousand tons | 8,7% |
Thus, Israel took fifth place among buyers of Ukrainian wheat flour, providing almost one-ninth of all exports of this product abroad.
This is especially noticeable compared to the previous season.
In the 2024/25 marketing year, Israel was not even in the top five importers of Ukrainian wheat flour. Fifth place was then occupied by Spain, which purchased 2.9 thousand tons. Consequently, the volume of supplies to Israel was below this mark.
An increase to 5.2 thousand tons means that the export of Ukrainian wheat flour to the Israeli market grew by at least approximately 79%. The exact dynamics may be even higher, as Israel’s separate indicator for the 2024/25 season was not included in the published top five.
It is also important that the Israeli direction expanded during a period when the overall Ukrainian export of wheat flour, on the contrary, was decreasing.
First place for other types of flour
Israel’s role is even more noticeable in the category that Ukrainian statistics define as “other types of flour.”
In the 2025/26 season, Ukraine exported 1.7 thousand tons of such products. Israel purchased 729 tons — 43.6% of all Ukrainian exports in this category.
This allowed Israel to take first place by a large margin:
- Israel — 729 tons;
- Moldova — 397 tons;
- Poland — 140 tons;
- Czech Republic — 130 tons;
- Netherlands — 113 tons.
Israel accounted for almost as many supplies as the other four countries in the top five combined.
“Other types” usually refer to flour made not from wheat: for example, from corn, rye, barley, oats, rice, buckwheat, or other grains and plant crops. The published data of the Ukrainian industry union does not disclose the exact structure of Israeli purchases within this category.
In the previous season, Israel purchased about 500 tons of other types of Ukrainian flour. The increase to 729 tons is approximately 46%.
At the same time, the entire Ukrainian export of this product decreased by more than 60% — from 4.6 thousand tons in 2024/25 to approximately 1.7 thousand tons in 2025/26. Israel not only increased its own purchases but also became the main market for this category.
NAnews — Israel News notes: it is this indicator that allows us to speak of Israel as one of the main buyers of Ukrainian flour. For regular wheat flour, the country is in fifth place, but for other types, it ranks first.
Second place in the purchase of groats and pellets
Supplies are not limited to flour.
In the 2025/26 season, Ukraine exported 26.2 thousand tons of groats and pellets. Of these, 6 thousand tons were sent to Israel.
The share of the Israeli market was 22.8%.
Only Moldova purchased more — 7.4 thousand tons. After Israel were Romania with 3.2 thousand tons, Costa Rica with 2.3 thousand tons, and Lithuania with 1.2 thousand tons.
Thus, Israel was among the key buyers in three directions:
- fifth place for wheat flour;
- first place for other types of flour;
- second place for groats and pellets.
In total, this is about 11.9 thousand tons of ready or partially processed Ukrainian grain products.
Israel depends on foreign grain
The increase in supplies occurs against the backdrop of Israel’s structural dependence on grain imports.
According to a report published in March 2026 by the Foreign Agricultural Service of the US Department of Agriculture, about 90% of Israel’s grain supply is provided by imports.
Israeli production covers only about 10% of the country’s wheat needs for the milling industry. Wheat production in the 2025/26 season is estimated at 60 thousand tons, while its total consumption reaches approximately 2.3 million tons.
Wheat imports to Israel in the 2025/26 season are estimated at 2.15 million tons. A similar volume is forecasted for the 2026/27 season.
About 70–80% of the wheat imported by Israel comes from Russia. The next important suppliers are Ukraine and Romania. The advantages of the Black Sea region remain competitive prices, relatively low transportation costs, and a shorter route to Israeli ports.
At the same time, it is necessary to distinguish between the import of wheat as raw material and the supply of already finished flour.
Israel meets most of its needs by purchasing grain, which is then processed domestically. Purchases of wheat for flour production are almost entirely handled by private companies. Imported grain can also be mixed with wheat grown by Israeli farms.
Therefore, 5.2 thousand tons of Ukrainian wheat flour do not yet define the entire Israeli bread market. However, the dynamics show that Ukrainian suppliers are gradually expanding their presence not only as sellers of grain raw materials but also as producers of finished products.
Food security market
For Israel, the stability of grain supplies is directly related to food security.
The country depends on maritime imports, and delivery routes pass through a region where military, political, and logistical risks persist.
In January 2026, legislation was approved in Israel requiring large holders of wheat and feed stocks to report their volumes to the state monthly. The goal was to increase market transparency and improve emergency preparedness.
At the same time, Israel continues to expand its grain storage capacities and seeks to diversify suppliers, although Black Sea grain retains a price advantage.
Against this backdrop, the increase in purchases of finished products from Ukraine can be seen as an additional supply channel.
It does not replace large-scale grain imports but allows Israeli companies to distribute risks between raw materials and already processed products.
As the analysis by NAnews — Israel News shows, the most significant result of the season is not even related to regular wheat flour. Israel became the largest buyer of other types of Ukrainian flour and the second market for Ukrainian groats and pellets.
This indicates an expansion of the trade structure between the countries: Ukraine supplies Israel not only with agricultural raw materials but also with increasingly significant volumes of products with a higher degree of processing.