Ukraine has lost a quarter of its farmland due to Russia’s occupation of several regions, in the south and east, its Ministry of Agriculture announced on Monday, without it however constitutes “a threat to the security of food ”of the country.
Despite the loss of 25% of arable land, the structure of the crops sown this year is more than enough to ensure consumption. of the Ukrainian population, ”Deputy Agriculture Minister Taras Vysotsky said at a press conference.
According to him, consumption was also reduced due to massive displacement [de population] and external migrationout of the country.
More than seven million Ukrainians are internally displaced, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). It added 7.3 million who fled abroad, more than half of them in Poland.
Despite the considerable loss of surfaces now in the hands of the Russians, the current structure of cultivated areas […] does not threaten the food security of Ukraineassured Mr. Vysotskiï in front of the press.
” Ukrainian farmers managed to prepare pretty well for sowing before the start of the war. In February, Ukraine already imported about 70% of the required fertilizer, 60% of phytosanitary products and about a third of the required amount of fuel. [pour l’ensemencement]. “
Russia’s occupation of some Ukrainian regions and the grain blockade imposed by the Russian Black Sea Fleet, however, forced Ukrainian farmers. to change their sown and the quantityfinally Mr. Vysotskiï was referred to.
Ukraine had before the war more than 30 million hectares of arable land, according to the World Data Center-Ukraine, an international NGO.
If the consequences of Russia’s aggression for the Ukrainian internal market seem limited for Mr Vysotskiï, the impossibility of exporting cereals produced abroad raises fears of a storm of famine in the coming months, according toUN.
Currently, between 20 and 25 million tonnes of cereals are blocked and this fall this number could rise to 70-75 million tonnes.alerted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on June 6, that the country was the fourth largest exporter of wheat and corn in the world before the Russian invasion.
The Russia-Ukrainian conflict is at odds with two grain superpowers-Russia and Ukraine together account for 30% of the world’s wheat exports. This led to rising prices of cereals and oils, whose prices exceeded those reached in the Arab spring in 2011 and the eating disorders of 2008.
France Media Agency
Source: Radio-Canada
