It is looking more likely the developing world will face a major famine later this year as Ukrainian ports remain unable to export the agricultural commodities their populations need to survive. As international forums filled with policy makers and agricultural experts debate the impact of food shortages, they are only recently beginning to discuss the technical complications related to reopening Ukrainian ports on the Black Sea. Ukraine needs safe maritime routes in the near future to meet the demand for its grain. Although some overland routes are available, far less grain can be shipped safely across Ukrainian territory during the war with Russia.
“Everyone has already understood that there are mere weeks to unlock the seaports, including by military means, and recommence exports. We do have [non-maritime] alternatives that allow for export, but it is small cargo volumes compared to ports,” said Ukraine’s First Deputy Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food Taras Vysotsky, according to a report by Bohdan Ustymenko of the Jamestown Foundation. Between March and May over 70 merchant vessels loaded with grain were unable to leave port due to the danger of armed attack by Russian forces.
One option used throughout history, although not without risk, is to create a naval convoy to protect shipments of grain. Vysotsky suggests a more viable option is for Ukraine to acquire a number of anti-ship weapons that can be deployed domestically and used to deter the Russian navy. Captain (ret.) Andrii Ryzhenko, a former officer in the Ukrainian Navy who served over 35 years at sea and ashore, says Ukraine needs a convincing sea denial capability; but to develop it, Kyiv will require assistance from its strategic international partners, including the United States. Andriy Klymenko, a Ukrainian expert said “There is no military solution to this problem now. To resolve the issue, the [Russian] Black Sea Fleet must be destroyed. Harpoon [anti-ship] missiles will not help.” As the summer heat increases in the coming weeks, shipments of wheat will begin rotting. He argues that it is time to build out critical railway infrastructure as other options may not work in the immediate future.
It appears unlikely NATO will risk unblocking the maritime routes by force. So far, the Royal Navy and the US have no immediate plans for a naval operation. The UN, according to one Ukrainian official, is considering a multilateral naval force to ensure safe passage of the grain through the Black Sea. The EU also is considering the possibility of establishing a naval mission to lift the Russian blockade on Ukrainian agricultural commodity exports, according to Eurointegration.com.au. Both plans, however, remain unlikely in the near future and may come too late for this year’s crops. At the end of May the Turkish government rejected the idea of US or British ships entering the Black Sea to escort Ukrainian ships carrying grain. Achim Steiner, the administrator of the United Nations Development Program, said that 70 poorer countries could end up in financial default over the grain, inflation, and other issues caused by the war in Ukraine. Although unlikely, perhaps some form of a humanitarian corridor protecting grain shipments in the Black Sea will work.
Other remaining challenges include the risk from the large number of Russian underwater mines that are floating freely in the Black Sea basin near Romania and Turkey, according to the Secretariat of the International Maritime Organization. The mines raise the risk to maritime crews of large and small vessels. Ships Russia sunk near Ukrainian ports also need to be raised and cleared by Kyiv, but the country lacks the type of equipment needed to remove them. The complicated technical dimensions of how to resolve this problem remain tantamount to populations throughout the developing world that depend on grain supplies from Ukraine. “In order to unblock Ukrainian seaports, a combination of various types of principal measures will have to be applied. These will arguably need to include providing Ukraine with a sufficient number of anti-ship weapons, reaching arrangements with Turkey on humanitarian demining in the Black Sea, and finding effective technical solutions for how to lift the sunken barges and cranes from the sea floor at port exits. No one “silver bullet” exists, but the window to act is closing rapidly,” according to Ustymenko.
Although developing countries will be the hardest hit, droughts and floods in various other grain growing regions around the world this year are further stressing global grain supplies. Sarah Menker, the CEO of the agricultural analytical company Gro Intelligence, testified recently before the United Nations Security Council that the “world has only 10 weeks of stored wheat reserves left” in warehouses. It is inexcusable that Western media has given little coverage to the impending famine.
World leaders will have their answer in the next two months.
Daria Novak served in the U.S. State Dept.
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