Russia remains Ukraine's key coal supplier, along with United States and Canada

The Russian Federation remains Ukraine's key coal supplier along with the United States and Canada.

In particular, coal imports from Russia in January-March 2018 were estimated at $472.4 million, shipments from the United States totaled $219.9 million and those from Canada amounted to $48.4 million.

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In total, Ukraine spent $760.5 million on coal imports in January-March 2018, which was 33.3% up year-over-year, the State Fiscal Service of Ukraine reported.

Over the period under review, Ukraine bought 5.7 million tonnes of coal abroad.

As UNIAN reported earlier, production of thermal and coking coal in Ukraine in 2017 shrank by 14.6% against 2016, to 34.916 million tonnes.

Hostilities in the eastern regions of Ukraine, which began in 2014, have caused a significant shortage of coal, primarily that of thermal anthracite produced in militant-controlled areas of Donetsk and Luhansk regions. After this, Ukraine started buying coal abroad.

In 2015, coal imports were estimated at $1.632 billion. Russia, the United States and Kazakhstan were the largest suppliers.

In 2016, Ukraine reduced spending on coal imports by 10%, to $1.467 billion.

In 2017, spending on coal imports rose by 1.87 times, to $2.744 billion.