The war in Ukraine is taking a toll outside Europe; it’s threatening the world's poorest countries.

The war in Ukraine is taking a toll outside Europe; it’s threatening the world's poorest countries.

The war in Ukraine has increased energy prices by up to 50%, and our part of Europe is facing the biggest refugee crisis since the end of the Second World War. However, its broader effects are starting to be felt in many other regions of the world. Interrupted supplies of grain, especially wheat, corn, and barley, are stretching supplies in sub-Saharan Africa, South-East Asia, and the Middle East.

Russia, together with Ukraine, accounts for up to 30% of the global wheat market. As a result of the war, the prices of crucial cereals, especially wheat and barley, have risen from 21% to 30%. According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO), it is not certain that Ukrainian farmers in 19 of the 24 regions surveyed will be able to plant and harvest new crops, let alone maintain livestock production to meet their export commitments.

In the next three months, production will become even thinner, and there will be acute food shortages in more than 40% of the regions in Ukraine. And we are not just talking about the most affected places in the besieged cities in the east, where People in Need and other humanitarian organisations are already trying to deliver at least basic food aid. We are talking about entire Ukraine.

As a result of the war in Ukraine, the world is on the brink of a potentially catastrophic food crisis. Developments in the coming months will determine how deep and devastating it will be. The problem will significantly affect the Sahel, North Africa, the Middle East and the Caucasus. Europe will be in the midst of an unprecedented crisis. The Czech Republic must take the helm during EU Presidency if we want to prevent catastrophe.

Putin's war threatens famine in Africa

A critical factor in the potential for this food crisis to be devastating is the countries to which Russia and Ukraine export their products. At least 50 countries are at least 30% dependent on supplies from Russia and Ukraine, often the poorest on the planet. Almost half of the wheat produced in Eastern Europe goes to the Middle East and North Africa, which are already facing severe poverty and food shortages. Rising prices or reduced supplies could unsettle an already fragile situation and drive millions more people into even greater distress. For example, in Egypt, the situation is critical; wheat prices have risen by 80% in the past year. Moreover, the country is dependent on supplies of sunflower oil from Ukraine, the world's largest producer of this commodity.

The possibility of the crisis spilling over from the economic sphere to others is huge. The political situation in the affected countries can hardly be considered stable, and a further deterioration in living standards could lead to civil unrest and the disintegration of already fragile governments. There is no need to look too far back in time to see how this might play out—Lebanon faced an economic crisis in 2019. The country has since faced massive fuel shortages and eminent inflationstory, which has caused a sharp decline in living standards.

Covid-19 and the war in Ukraine, the threats of recent months

Countries in the Global South were much better prepared in 2019 for unpredictable swings in global agricultural markets. However, the two-year-long covid-19 pandemic has undermined capacities and abilities to respond flexibly to shortages. As a result, more than 26 million Africans have been pushed into extreme poverty. Yemen is a country where ongoing conflict has kept more than 23 million people on the brink of survival since 2014—it will surely suffer significantly from turbulence in the global food market. The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) is sounding the alarm, warning that the escalating conflict in Ukraine is already impacting the poorest people on the planet. They are unable to respond to the ever-increasing prices of basic foodstuffs. A key objective of the Food and Agriculture Organisation is to keep markets open for grain-exporting countries and find an alternative to replace the current supply shortfall.