Successful Farming published an analysis of the Black Sea Grain Initiative and its suspension by Russia. The article includes written comments by IFPRI senior research fellows Joseph Glauber and David Laborde. The researchers state that Ukrainian farmers and food-importing nations in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA)will feel the pain of the Russian interruption of grain exports through the Black Sea corridor. The importer nations face their highest need for grain in the months ahead with supplies in doubt and commodity prices jolted higher.
“Higher global market prices mean consumers around the world will pay more for imports,” wrote Glauber and Laborde in a blog. But farmers in Ukraine, unable to benefit from higher prices, were expected to sow less winter wheat. That would mean a continued strain on taut world supplies because Ukraine ordinarily accounts for 10 percent of global wheat exports. MENA countries are particularly reliant on grain from Ukraine and “they tend to buy more during the winter to supplement their own harvests which are largely consumed by the end of the year,” said the IFPRI analysts. “The renewed interruption in imports could increase food insecurity in these countries and potentially exacerbate political tension.”
