Minister in new 'wartime' plan to retain food supplies
Minister for Agriculture Charlie McConalogue is drawing up what is being described as a "wartime" plan to prevent disruption to food supplies as a result of the conflict in Ukraine.
Russia and Ukraine are significant suppliers of both grains and fertilisers for the global agriculture sector.
The Agriculture Minister has now assembled an emergency team within his department to come up with financial supports to encourage farmers to grow native grains.
Ireland is heavily reliant on imported grains for both human and animal food.
The plan will have to be finalised quickly as spring crops must be planted in the next six weeks.
A similar scheme was introduced during World War II when all farmers here were asked to plant crops.
Measures to ensure farmers grow, and save, enough grass to feed livestock this year and over next winter are also being examined.
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Food crisis looms as Ukrainian wheat shipments grind to halt
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Prices soar as Black Sea ports at virtual standstill amid Russian assault
At this time of year, Kees Huizunga is normally busy planting wheat, barley and corn on his farm in central Ukraine. But, having lost workers to the frontline, the Dutch national left his grain silos to sound the alarm about the impact of the Russian invasion on global wheat supply.
Russia and Ukraine
supply almost a third of the world’s wheat exports and since the Russian assault on its neighbour, ports on the Black Sea have come to a virtual standstill. As a result, wheat prices have soared to record highs, overtaking levels seen during the food crisis of 2007-08.
“If farmers in Ukraine don’t start planting any time soon there will be huge crisis to food security. If Ukraine’s food production falls in the coming season the wheat price could double or triple,” said the Dutch national, who has been farming for two decades in Cherkasy, 200km south of Kyiv. He is part of a farming union, whose 1,100 members cover just under 10 per cent of the country’s farmland.
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The surge in prices will fuel soaring food inflation — already at a seven-year high of 7.8 per cent in January — and the biggest impact will be on the food security of poorer grain importers, warned analysts and food aid organisations.
Ukraine accounts for 90 per cent of Lebanon’s wheat imports and is a leading supplier for countries including Somalia, Syria and Libya. Lebanon is “really struggling with an already high import bill and this is only going to make things worse,” said James Swanston, emerging market economist at Capital Economics.
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The WFP, which procures grains and food to distribute to poorer countries, bought just under 1.4m tonnes of wheat last year of which 70 per cent came from Ukraine and Russia.
Prior to the invasion it was already facing a 30 per cent increase in the cost of wheat, because of poor harvests in Canada, the US and Argentina. The latest surge in grain prices would further curtail its ability to provide aid, it said.
“This is an unnecessary shock of mega proportions,” said Arif Husain, chief economist at the UN World Food Programme.
High prices could trigger unrest, analysts said.
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Russia accounts for two-thirds of Egypt’s wheat exports. Egyptian authorities say their wheat inventories will last until mid June and the Egyptian local harvest should start coming in by mid April. Any rise in subsidised bread prices and further increase in food inflation in Egypt “increases the threat of social unrest,” said Swanston.
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Wheat inventories are tight everywhere and as Chinese and South Korean buyers of Ukrainian corn, used to feed livestock, sought sellers elsewhere, EU agricultural ministers on Wednesday discussed allowing farmers to boost production using the 10 per cent of land they usually leave fallow in response to the war in Ukraine.
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️Air raid alert in Poltava.
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