The executive branch of the 27-member European Union (EU) has proposed a series of actions to assist Ukraine in exporting its vast array of agricultural produce amid Russia’s ongoing blockade of maritime shipping lanes.
On May 12, the European Commission said in a statement that it is working to establish “solidarity lanes” to not only help Ukraine ship grain to avoid a looming global food security crisis, but also “import the goods it needs.”
EU Commissioner for Transport Adina Valean said 20 million tons of grain need to be exported from Ukraine in the next three months using EU infrastructure.
Before Russia renewed its invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, Black Sea ports accounted for 90 percent of Ukraine’s export of grain and oil seeds. Approximately one-third of Ukrainian agricultural exports are shipped yearly to Europe, China and Africa, the European Commission added.
To alter logistics, Valean called the task “gigantesque” while emphasizing the need to “coordinate and optimize the logistical chains, put in place in new routes, and avoid as much as possible, the bottlenecks.”
Ukraine’s pre-war grain productions saw 75 percent of output being exported, accounting for 20 percent of export revenue in hard currency.
Besides preventing Ukraine from maritime shipping in the Azov and Black seas, invading Russian forces have bombarded food storage and agricultural facilities, grain silos and even has confiscated grain and either shipped them to the occupied Crimean peninsula or mainland Russia.
Earlier this month, Ukraine’s Defense Ministry said an estimated 400,000 tons of grain had been stolen.
And as recent as May 16, a storage facility for ammonia nitrate – a key fertilizer used in Ukraine – had been destroyed by Russian shelling in Kharkiv Oblast, according to Pavlo Kyrylenko, head of the Donetsk Oblast Military Administration.
Ukraine is a leading exporter of corn, wheat and sunflower oil whose transportation has been largely stalled due to all-out war and Russia’s maritime blockade.
Before the full-scale invasion, Ukraine would normally export 5 million tons of grain per month whereas now it is averaging 500,000 tons monthly, Bloomberg reported.
The United Nations earlier this month warned that food prices as a result of Russia’s unprovoked invasion could rise as much as 22 percent and “leave 13.1 million additional people undernourished,” the business news publication said.
