KIEV, Aug. 17 (Xinhua) — Ukraine will lose at least 1 billion U.S. dollars this year due to trade and transit restrictions imposed by Russia, a Ukrainian official said Wednesday.

Russia's transit ban will directly reduce Ukraine's export volume to Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, and cut Ukraine's gross domestic product (GDP) by 0.3 percent this year, Ukraine's Economic Development and Trade Deputy Minister Nataliya Mykolska told the country's media outlet Apostrophe.

In the first five months of 2016, Ukraine's export volume to Russia fell by 36.2 percent year-on-year and is expected to plunge further, she said.

Agriculture, metallurgy, freight and logistics industry, packaging industry, pharmaceutical industry and light industry will also suffer losses, she added.

Since the start of 2016, Moscow has taken a series of restrictive measures against Ukraine, including the suspension of a Russia-Ukraine free trade agreement in response to Kiev joining a free trade zone of the European Union.

Besides, Moscow has imposed a total ban on the import of agricultural products from Ukraine, and restricts the automobile and railway transit of goods from Ukraine via Russia.

In response, Kiev has canceled preferential import duties on a range of Russian goods and imposed an embargo on some products made in Russia.