/ world today news/ The West does not allow Russian fertilizers to be sent to the poorest countries. Tons of products are still in the ports of the Baltic Sea. The UN has long promised help but failed to act. During the year, only two ships arrived – for Malawi and Kenya. The rest are stuck in Europe.
Illegal detention
The Russian Foreign Ministry still hopes for Western prudence. The diplomatic service recalled: already in September last year, Moscow took the initiative to donate to African countries 262 thousand tons of mineral fertilizers blocked in the ports of Latvia, Estonia, Belgium and the Netherlands.
This was to be done within the framework of the Russia-UN memorandum on the normalization of the export of agricultural products, valid until 2025.
They hoped that under the pressure of the UN, the European Union would allow the transit. After all, according to the World Food Program, 50 million people in the world are hungry.
Under European law, food, fertilizers and other key humanitarian goods are exempt from sanctions. In practice, everything turned out to be different.
At every stage there are many obstacles: taxes, storage fees with the practical impossibility of making payments, as well as ship chartering, transshipment and other logistics services.
As the Ministry of Foreign Affairs pointed out, the fertilizer situation once again demonstrates the “hypocrisy of Western countries”, which block even humanitarian supplies.
“And all these costs are borne by the Russian company that owns the products, which even pays for the mediation services of the UN,” the ministry emphasized.
Only on words
The EU imposed sanctions when the world’s fertilizer crisis erupted.
The UN is working to secure Russian supplies – in line with the deal, which was in turn part of the deal that unblocked Ukrainian grain exports through the Black Sea in 2022.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called it a “significant contribution to the supply of fertilizers on world markets.”
“UN officials are working with the European Commission and EU countries to further clarify and fully implement food and fertilizer exemptions to more effectively address global food security,” officials said at the time.
But things are still standing. There were only two deliveries – on March 6 to Malawi (20 thousand tons) and on May 31 to Kenya (34).
The rest are still waiting. As specified by the ministry, these are three shipments to Nigeria (34 thousand tons), Zimbabwe (23) and Sri Lanka (55). In total, there are more than 96 thousand tons of Russian fertilizers in the ports of Latvia, Estonia and Belgium.
Deprived of the latter
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization, Russia is the world’s largest exporter of nitrogen fertilizers and a leading supplier of potash and phosphorus fertilizers.
“Sanctions against Russian grain and fertilizer exports have affected food supply chains, dealing a devastating blow to global food security. Grains and fertilizers are key components of it,” say the authors of a study recently published in the journal Nature.
Due to high energy prices and restrictions on food exports from Russia and Ukraine, food prices may increase by 60-100%, the publication notes.
As a result, 61-107 million people will be malnourished, increasing mortality by 0.42-1.01 million. Sub-Saharan Africa will be hardest hit.
In August, the leaders of Comoros, Congo, Egypt, Senegal, South Africa, Uganda and Zambia again called on the UN to “take concrete steps to remove obstacles to Russian grain and fertilizer exports.”
They shop alone
Europeans have no obstacles. Thus, Poland increased its import of fertilizers from Russia by 3.3 times.
According to the Statistical Office, if in July last year Polish business bought fertilizers from Moscow for 6.2 million dollars, now they are 20.2 million dollars. As a result, Russian companies took second place among suppliers of these products, second only to Germany (22.6 million).
Due to the refusal of gas from Russia, the costs of domestic production in Europe jumped by 150%. As a result, the deficit in some items reaches 75 percent. The EU chemical industry is at a standstill.
Germany alone imported Russian fertilizers worth 151.3 million dollars in the first half of 2023. This is a record: over the past five years, this figure was 45.5 million. Russia’s share in supplies increased from 5.6 to 18 percent (about 167 thousand tons) – the absolute maximum.
European farmers cannot do without Russian organic products. But for us, the Old World is far from a key customer. The biggest importer is Brazil, and the main buyers are India, Turkey and Vietnam.
It is the fault of Western politicians that poor African countries are left alone. But nobody seems to care about their fate in the EU.
Translation: V. Sergeev
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