On Thursday, June 2, 2022 at 1:58:48 PM UTC+8, David P. wrote:
> Ukraine-Russia War Is Fueling Triple Crisis in Poor Nations
> By Joe Wallace, May 24, 2022, WSJ
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> High inflation and interest rates could push more than 70 countries into default, according to Mr. Steiner. They would follow Sri Lanka, which recently became the first Asian country to default on its debt this century amid protests that turned violent and led to the collapse of the government.
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> Supplies of wheat and other foodstuffs are blocked in Ukraine’s Black Sea ports, creating shortages and sending prices higher in nations such as Egypt, the world’s biggest wheat importer. Energy supply chains face dislocations, too, as Russian oil is increasingly shunned in global oil markets.
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> Wheat prices in Chicago, the global benchmark, have surged more than 50% this year and are close to record highs at about $12 a bushel. Corn has risen 32% and soybeans 26%. Benchmark Brent crude prices have climbed 46% to about $114 a barrel, while diesel and gasoline prices have rallied to a series of records and U.S. natural-gas prices have more than doubled in 2022.
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> The commodity shock has fanned inflation in the U.S. and Europe, pushing central banks to raise interest rates and hurting low-income consumers. For many poorer economies, higher import prices risk also feeding into financial stress by draining foreign-currency reserves and boosting financing requirements from overseas. That could be particularly problematic at a time when interest rates are rising, and after many countries took on debt during the pandemic.
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> “The three-headed hydra of energy, food and debt” will “lead to a collapse of family incomes and government services in many developing countries,” said Mark Malloch-Brown, president of the Open Society Foundations. Meanwhile, the Ukraine crisis itself is absorbing a greater proportion of Western aid budgets, said Mr. Steiner of the UNDP..
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> The most pressing concern for officials and executives is the availability of food as Russia blockades Ukraine’s Black Sea ports and fertilizer supplies from Russia and Belarus are disrupted.
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> Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, said Tuesday that Russia was bombarding grain warehouses in Ukraine, blockading Ukrainian ships full of wheat and sunflower seeds and hoarding its own food exports as a form of blackmail. “This is using hunger and grain to wield power,” she said.
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> Svein Tore Holsether, chief executive of major fertilizer producer Yara International ASA, said the world is in a dire food crisis. Even if peace was restored in Ukraine now, it would still take considerable time to re-establish the supply lines that support the global food industry, he said.
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> “Food is a weapon in war, and now we’re seeing that,” Mr. Holsether said.
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> https://www.wsj.com/articles/russian-ukraine-war-precipitates-a-triple-crisis-in-poor-nations-11653406985

Disruptors like climate change and covid pandemic are main contributors to harvesting shortages of foods and grains.