Is a “Wheat Crisis” Next as Ukrainian Grain Shipments Halt?
Chinese officials warns that nation’s winter wheat condition could be “worst in history”.
While oil prices are exploding, and petroleum products are certainly a necessity in modern life, there is a potential developing crisis that could impact the global economy even more than energy.
As Russia continues to pound Ukraine, it is important to note that the region is responsible for about 1/3 of the world’s grain supplies.
Russia and Ukraine supply almost a third of the world’s wheat exports and since the Russian assault on its neighbour, ports on the Black Sea have come to a virtual standstill. As a result, wheat prices have soared to record highs, overtaking levels seen during the food crisis of 2007-08. “If farmers in Ukraine don’t start planting any time soon there will be huge crisis to food security.
If Ukraine’s food production falls in the coming season the wheat price could double or triple,” said the Dutch national, who has been farming for two decades in Cherkasy, 200km south of Kyiv. He is part of a farming union, whose 1,100 members cover just under 10 per cent of the country’s farmland. While well stored wheat, such as that on Huizinga’s farm, can last several months, agricultural experts and policymakers have warned of the impact of delayed shipments on countries reliant on the region for wheat, grain, sunflower oil and barley. “
They’re going to have to find different suppliers and all that means higher prices,” said Joseph Glauber, the former chief economist at the US Department of Agriculture and a senior fellow at agricultural policy think-tank IFPRI.
The prices are rising fast, even in regions that export wheat.
Even consumers in two of the world’s biggest wheat-growing nations, Canada and the United States, are paying the price.
“Unfortunately for the short and intermediate term, food inflation and the cost of baked goods in the United States will go up more. This will impact the most vulnerable in our society the most,” said Robb MacKie, president and chief executive of the American Bakers Association.
Weeks before the latest wheat price spike, Calgary Italian Bakery in Alberta raised prices 7% to keep pace with costs associated with last year’s Canadian drought and inflation in prices of flour and yeast.
Now Louis Bontorin, co-owner of the 60-year-old family business, fears he will need to raise prices significantly again, once he has depleted his four to five months’ flour supply.
“This could be really, really devastating,” Bontorin said. “Bread is one of the fundamentals, the essentials, and that’s the hard part. You’re trying to just take what you need, but you’re also cognizant of what effect (higher price) has on the consumer.
“The buying power of everybody is just being eroded.”
The stability of regions even more dependent on Russian-Ukrainian wheat is threatened.
Cairo relies on large volumes of heavily subsidized imports to ensure sufficient as well as affordable supplies of bread and vegetable oil for its 105 million citizens. Securing those supplies has led Egypt to become the world’s largest importer of wheat and among the world’s top 10 importers of sunflower oil. In 2021, Cairo was already facing down food inflation levels not seen since the Arab Spring civil unrest a decade earlier that toppled the government of former President Hosni Mubarak.
After eight years of working assiduously to put Egypt’s economic house back in order, the government of President Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi is now similarly vulnerable to skyrocketing food costs that are reaching budget-breaking levels.
How much worse can it get. China, the biggest consumer of wheat, is warning that the condition of the nation’s winter wheat crop could be the “worst in history.”
Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the country’s annual parliament meeting, Minister of Agriculture and Rural Affairs Tang Renjian said that rare heavy rainfall last year delayed the planting of about one-third of the normal wheat acreage. read more
A survey of the winter wheat crop taken before the start of winter found that the amount of first- and second-grade crop was down by more than 20 percentage points, Tang said.
“Not long ago we went to the grassroots to do a survey and many farming experts and technicians told us that crop conditions this year could be the worst in history,” he said. “This year’s grain production indeed faces huge difficulties.”
War – check.
Pestilence – check.
Famine – This looks like the next horseman lining up to make an appearance.
But the good news: No mean tweets. We can take comfort in that.
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Comments
Gee, it just maybe a good idea to pause turning food (corn) into energy (ethanol) so people won’t starve.
That would require admitting that global warming is less important than people.
Global warming and climate change is about the impact on people idiot. Why on earth do you think many people are worried about it. It’s not some remote problem it impacts on everyday people’s lives all the time.
Sure. That’s why we’re continuing to divert food to cars when we’re about to have major starvation.
Yep, totally about the impact on people…
Did I say that there was an immediate impact on food production no. Some of the changes will be longer term or will impact different regions which will in turn have knock on effects
Um, yeah … IF it indeed IS a “problem” that human beings MAY have ANY “control” over -I believe not really and not really – it would present WAY more remote a threat than this year’s potential politically-aggravated worldwide famine.
Sure I take you point regarding climate changes impacts being not being as severe as the war in Ukraine in the immediate present. That doesn’t change the fact that it will have large long term effects
That isn’t a fact.
Please indicate – with the relevant data – how climate change is negatively impacting people. Cereal yields up. Life expectancy up. Weather deaths down. If you have data that says otherwise, please point to it.
Over the longer term climate change will: increase droughts, increase sea levels, cause more heat waves, cause issues with eco systems.
Many of the deaths from heat waves are directly tied to the increase in temperature. That’s not a trivial figure either.
Sea level rises will mean population displacement, that means more migration to areas not so badly affected.
Temperature rises will increase food yields in some areas but will decrease in others. This will be dependant on the temperature. With the predicted temperature rises the increase will at some point turn into a net decrease in yield globally.
Absolute crap. All of it. And we all know it.
What are you going to do, Fat, show up with a math book from 2022 to “prove” that 2 + 2 = yellow? I mean, why not? That’s what students feelza and stuff. So sure, they think we only have (count them from the 70sish, 10 years being the usual lie) to turn everything around. That was in the 70s. You get that, right? It’s 2022 and AOC is wailing that we have only 8 years before utter planetary destruction. Or, you know, the oceans rising a fraction of a quarter of a fraction of an inch .. . . over FIFTY years.
The horror! How will we ever prepare? My GOD! A fraction of a fraction of an INCH over FIFTY years!! The calamity. We’re DOOOOOOOOOOOOOMED! What do we do, like take a step back when the tide comes in to accommodate this horror show of humanity’s destruction? Nooooooo, people are STUPID, they will drown in a fraction of a fraction of an inch of ocean rising over the course of 50 years.
I bet that two generations of WuFlu-masked kids doused in CRT will heroically vow to place themselves in the way of the fraction of a fraction of inch tidal wave tsunami that threatens all life on earth to protect the black kids from getting a fraction of a fraction of their big toe wet. Such progress, and in only fifty years! Sure it took that whole breeze blowing on the puddle to convince the crazies that their big toe is in dire need of immediate taxation.
“Raising taxes,” the Obamlet recently intoned from his multi-million dollar ocean-front property is the only way to protect . . . erm, ugh, gah, the planet. Yes, the former president acknowledged, he had purchased this beach front estate knowing that in as soon as 500 million years, oceans might rise a few inches. That time scale, the former president intoned while cheerfully shaking his mint-killing mojito, was a risk he could see taking himself but that was obviously too risky for the poor and working people of the world. When pressed for an answer, the former president just grinned and mused about how he was the first president with a weird name and dark skin elected president.
Yawn.
Interesting Fact – when CO2 goes up, plants need and use fewer respiratory pores. So, they expire less water into the atmosphere.
The higher the CO2 goes, the less water plants need. And, just like that deserts start blooming.
Note that Fatkins didn’t provide any data. He made predictions, which are not facts.
If you haven’t bothered to discover that man made climate change has no more to do with science or climate, then mask mandates have to do with health, your description of Voyager applies to you. Cornwall Alliance would be a good place to start your research.
Are you honestly this gullible?
Gee Fat, the best suggestion I ca make about your global warming and lack of food supply is …..lets have a Nuclear War! No people, no food worries! Are YOU ready to meet your Maker??
How DARE you!!
Not only does the UNNECESSARY usage of corn to make ethanol and dilute our gas drive up food prices, but the shortage of FERTILIZER will be causing more farmers to NOT plant corn! China has reportedly “warned” that they will not be exporting fertilizer until mid June! That old saying “knee high by July” is a very true indicator for corn! Soon farmers will need to resort to using human waste as fertilizer. When that happens the dems will have gone full circle in turning everything they touch into crap!!
They have already turned to crap!! Note Russia is the biggest exporter of potash and fertilizer. The price to our farmers has more than doubled. Are the feds going to subsidized farmers so they can buy these products to keep their crop yields high? Probably not. Dems hate farmers.
I agree that using alcohol in gas is a bad policy. Shelf life of the gas is lower, and alcohol is hydroscopic. The end result is corrosion. On top of that, ethanol is not economically viable for that use.
Still, it is our resource to use as we wish, to use in our best interests. There are far too many people who consistency reproduce beyond their means, it is foolish to keep bailing them out, both overseas and at home.
The U.S. is the No. 3 exporter of wheat. Excluding global supply/demand mechanics, the U.S. could easily moderate wheat-based inflation. Further, consumers could easily substitute potatoes and rice for many of their starch needs (except Twinkies, etc.), or switch to corn flakes from Wheaties, or whatever. Not too worried here.
Do I care about China’s wheat needs? Or Egypt’s? No, not really.
I am not eating cauliflower pizza crust.
The last time wheat prices were this high we got the Arab Spring. A significant food shortage in N Africa, Mid east and Central Asia can result in destabilization which you might not care about but is entirely capable of resulting in secondary and tertiary consequences which you may not like.
The N American spring planting of grain crops was already facing issues due to enormous increases in cost for nitrogen fertilizer and potash. Belarus and Russia, before sanctions era, were major suppliers of both. It would be one thing to be cavalier if we had maintained food and energy independence, we didn’t and the events around the world impact us.
Well, let’s back up here because the Arab Spring was a completely fabricated Obama-Soros invention that was intended to sweep the planet (here in America, it was “Occupy”) and ring in the Great Reset. Fabricated, paid, and psyops “grassroots” are not based in any marker, economic or otherwise, it’s all political. Always.
What a mess that was,,, and it keeps on giving with illegal immigration to Europe, slave markets, all the outcome of the minds of Obama, Soros and tah-dah Hillary.
Fuzzy,
I agree that the political events of the Arab Spring were manipulated. That’s very true, but it’s also true that the manipulators seized the opportunity to exploit the crisis presented by the food shortage.
The doctrine of ‘never let a crisis go to waste’ doesn’t mean only exploiting an artificially manufactured crisis. Naturally occurring crisis or those created a natural consequence of other problems are also eligible for exploitation.
Agreed, Chief, good point. But it’s important, I think, to note that the Biden-Obama-Clinton-Soros Democrat Axis of Evil really doesn’t care who dies for their cause (as long as it’s not them). Even given that, I don’t think Arabs were Arab spinging over wheat, anymore than I think Occupiers give a damn about . . . anyone. It’s all theater, narrative, and bs; what Democrats have used to rule and “nudge” us for decades. Enough. And the sooner the workers of the world unite (ala the Canadian #FreedomTrucker movement), the sooner we put this crazy to bed.
The most important thing in any battle is not knowing your enemies’ weakness, it’s knowing your enemy. Period.
When I am told by dubious sources (the radical left as manifested in media, Hollyweird, infotainment, whatever), I can very clearly see that they clearly want me to hate people based on the color of their skin, gender, sexuality, blah blah blah (the list is exhausting; another sign they are losing).
I am told by these feeble-brained maroons that my enemy is the black person, or the homosexual person, or the whatever divisive BS they’ve dreamed up this week. Yeah, no.
You know who is fomenting this hate, this division, this evil? Oh, right, the freakishly radical fringe left. There I see my–and my beloved country’s–enemy, not in the face of my neighbors of any skin hue, be they masked or unmasked.
I particularly feel sorry for the shrieking mask Karens; manipulated, lied to, and victimized, these hideous blights on our nation are pitiful. And sad. Can you even begin to imagine being so completely nutso, antisocial, screechy about . . . anything? These women are victims here (and okay, I have pretty much zero tolerance for stuipid. And mean. And stupid and mean wrapped in a condescending virtue-signalling haz-mat suit with three cloth masks and a plastic face shield? Oh, I laugh and laugh and laugh. I don’t care if I drop dead tomorrow from one of those mysterious auto-accident/WuFlu deaths. Let the left laugh, because honestly, they have given me over two years worth of constant hilarity over this covid porn obsession.
That crazy Karen berating people in grocery stores and on the streets? She can sustain her giant butt for about a week. That’s including the Karen fat storage they all have.
Wait is that fat-shaming or just noting that all these freaking Karen lunatics are obese and thus at higher risk for negative WuFlu outcomes? Heck, maybe that’s why they all lost their minds? We’re fat as hell, and we need to be bundled in fifty-eleven masks, plus a plastic bubble, plus a six-foot bumper car waist ornament (and okay, WHY don’t any of the WuFlu deflecting, social distancing bumper cars fit around my sort of waist area? I’m perfect. A goddess, really. And super woke! They should just fit because how dare they not! I’m organizing a boycott today on all the big fat Karen fat-shaming companies that refuse to make Titanic-sized WuFlu bumper boats for the full-figured women who has ten other comorbidities and demands to get less WuFlu than those . . . unvaccinated scum!
Being fit and stuff won’t protect them, only my full-body bubble shield plus ill-fitting bumper boat will, and I’ll sue any airline who refuses to allow me to take up four rows with my bumper bubble and demand for social distancing as recommended by the CDC for the price of one ticket. Fascists! Oh, right, the CDC changed its science and recommendations, but that was only because. Orange Man Bad. The rest of us are all in on the truth, the Fauci truth. We know the secret and when to listen to the CDC–no one else knows, just us leftie Karens, we’re in on it because we are so special . . . and fat. I think. Anyway, just try to stop me and my gigantic bumper bubble from taking up however many seats and rows on a flight. I am special, and I know when the CDC is telling the “Truth” and when they are not, and now they are not.
But obviously Republicans who control no part of federal government want all grandmas to die! I’ll be a grandma one day, well, I’m in my mid-thirties, early-forties and super committed to the destruction of America . . . and I still think Twitter is life, so maybe not getting married (or even dating) any day soon.
In fact, scratch that, the new woke slogan is “you killers of super fat, super lonely, super depressed, and super nonfunctional antisocial leftie Karens!” How can you? We are people, too. Well, sort of, if you extract the empathy, logic, and normal human feelings. We’re JUST LIKE people. Mostly. So there! Killers of the big fat Karen shrew! Take that to the polls in November!
Erm, yes, please.
The central point is that hungry people are desperate people. Those desperate people can then be manipulated. Bad harvests and a resulting food shortage vastly increase the odds of political turmoil/upheaval. History holds many examples of this scenario playing out. The French Revolution followed several successively bad harvests and the multiple revolutions of 1848 followed the failure of the potato harvest to name just two examples.
Fuzzy, you need to let your emotions and thoughts out. It is not healthy to keep it all bottled up.
bwahaha! That’s clearly my philosophy. 😛
@Fuzzy
That was quite the rant. I’m not sure whether to take anything you’ve said remotely seriously it was an impressive display of well being a Karen.
You can take everything I say seriously, Fat. Everything. I am so over you right now it’s not even funny. And no, not this sophomoric comment to me because your opinion means less than nothing to me. You are disrupting our LI community with your constant comments (how many do you post a day? It’s beyond crazy, and you don’t even like us or agree with us, so why are you even here? Just to sow discord and disharmony, right? I mean why else? You are disdainful and rude and condescending and elitist, looking down on us (from your ridiculous hovel that pretty much everyone here can fit in their basement), dripping your disdain from every pore and attacking us as if you matter.
Here’s my prediction. In two months, no one will have a clue who you are are or were on LI. We’ve suffered trolls like you before and happily forgotten them. The most recent was mark something or other. He’s gone. No one cares.
Nitrogen fertilizer is absent because it’s made from natural gas. Potash comes from Russia and Belarus. Phosphates are all stuck in China because of their screwed up supply chain.
10-10-10 fertilizer is becoming 0-0-0. And, the African harvest will be 100 Million tons short. Next year’s will be worse.
We are entering the Largest Starvation Event in human history.
Yep, they have it all worked out so they can pretty much rain down famine wherever they like. Something might be wrong with that, right?
Africa has been living beyond their means as long as I can remember. It is time that they go through the same process which created whites and Asians. Evolution is brutal.
Hey Fuzzy: You are right that Bummer was so worried about oceans rising that he recently bought a multi-million dollar home on the beach. But you forgot that Biden did the exact same thing. Biden’s new multi-million dollar house in Rehoboth beach DE is approximately inches above sea level.
And BTW, is there really a state that makes it illegal to grow your own tomatoes? Where?
The Biden (who?) clamp down on energy….. natural gas used to make nitrogen fertilizer … will affect US production. Shortage=starvation=depopulation…. a globalist dream. The sad part is that we can’t punish our “leaders” enough for this. I am certain Psaki, Mayor Pete and all will be looking for green solutions …but there already is one .. Soylent Green.
Banging my victory garden drum again, be warned. Heh.
If you don’t already have a veg and herb garden, get it started now. Those seeds don’t just magically produce a bounty, so get started today on your new self-sufficiency garden.
Check out your zone, learn what you can easily grow given your temps and rains, and then start planting all that stuff. Or maybe just start with a tomato plant, four-year-olds grow tomatoes, so we can certainly manage it.
The Biden admin doesn’t care what they do to us, and they are not preparing for the obvious short-term problems by unleashing American energy production. It’s up to us. So get that garden going and growing, learn about the pests and soil requirements, and expect it to take several seasons to get enough of any crop to feed you, let alone your family, friends, and neighbors. And that is our goal, we must start now in producing our own food because we sure can’t rely on the Biden government to do it; just look at that embarrassing shambles!
I live in Florida, I can’t grow wheat, but I can grow a LOT of tomatoes and peppers (all kinds, bell, jalapeno, you name it), and cukes (though there is a terrible cuke worm thing I keep getting hit by and don’t know how to combat, so cukes may be off the menu). The thing is, learn about and grow what you can where you are. We will sort out the supply chains as needed.
If you think it’s important to crank up American oil and gas production, then you KNOW it’s important we start growing our food. Do it.
“four-year-olds grow tomatoes, so we can certainly manage it.”
This is funny. My wife, who is an uncredentialed master gardener, just can’t make tomatoes work here (Arizona). Never had a problem anywhere else. Cherry tomatoes she can manage, but barely. But if carrots and scallions could save the world, she’d be Wonder Woman.
I refer to my victory garden as “the killing fields” where perfectly healthy plants suffer premature, gruesome deaths.
@pasadena Phil
Ha, that made me laugh. Gardening is not my forte, unless you count chilli plants that’s about it.
ah, so you can be normal. I recommend being normal more often.
I’ve been paying attention to your comments, and this was before you falsely accused me of “shadowbanning” you and then falsely accused me of lying about it.I don’t shadowban, I don’t play games, and when I am done, I am done. You are pushing my boundaries. Big time.
As I said, you are on my radar. If you want to be normal, as here, fine. But if you think you have us figured out and can attack any of us, sow division, you are wrong. There is no “safe” target for you on this website; do not attack, condescend to, or mock any of us. That includes your favorite targets of late. For example, I may not agree with Milhouse on some issue (though I do on most) and other long-time LI commenters may give him a hard time, but here’s the truth: Milhouse is one of us; you are not. You attack him, you attack us. That’s just one example, but we have a community here, and you are an outsider.
Keep pushing the wrong buttons, and you are gone. I think that’s what you people call “transparency” (or maybe it’s bullying? or verbal violence?). I could give a rat’s patootie what you call it. I’m telling you to back off; you are acting like king of a castle when you’ve barely seen the moat. Know your place and stop being rude to people who matter to our whole community; after all, no one will miss you, Fat, when you’ve blustered and condescended and ruded your way out. Literally no one. And you are, right now, on your way out.
Keep attacking, mocking, belittling Milhouse and our other regular long-time readers (and authors), and see how that works out for you. No shadowbans, just gone. And not without warning, here is your (second) warning.
I think two warnings is more than sufficient. Oh, and here’s a fun fact, I don’t care what you think or how your feelz about it. What are you going to do, take your leftie troll act over to TownHall. That’ll show us. Or something.
Planting potatoes for the first time.
If I had the space, I would be buying in staples like flour and sugar for the long term. But I live in an apartment. And, my extra space is already filled with my emergency food supply.
Everyone, replace your toilet with a homemade urine diverting toilet. Urine is a great source of nitrogen for your garden 🙂 Should I post articles? Also, learn about Hügelkultur, the best way to improve your soil.
Sure WE have abundant wheat production, but will you be surprised at all when the turnip in the White House demands – DICTATES – that WE must endure shortages to feed the rest of the world?? What is their mantra now “we must endure some pain to help the world” or something like that??
To which I say hell no.
Perhaps China should have thought a bit before supporting the invasion.
Sounds like more Bidenflation opportunities to me. Keep it up, lefty idiots.
Food and energy independence are not hyperbole…they are valuable aspirations of any 1st world nation!
In Bible passages expurgated during the Council of Nicea, there are actually Five Horsemen. In those passages, the first horseman is actually Dementia.
I cannot tell if you are sarcastic or not….
In a world where the NYT routinely beats out the Babylon Bee with the very same story… get used to it.
And I saw 5 horsemen,, and on the first horse road… ah…. The Big Guy.
“In those passages, the first horseman is actually Dementia.”
The first horseman rode to the white house prepared to strike the president. Realizing the president had already been struck, the horseman rode on.
So where am I going to get my gluten now?!?!
Shouldn’t America’s massive wheat production give us some cushioning from the price rise?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheat_production_in_the_United_States
in a univariate simple world with no collateral damage, maybe
And lastly, I’m not saying this will happen but if you could fetch a higher price for your US wheat overseas wouldn’t you sell more there and less here? Again, in a one factor world that has the potential to lower the US supply until an equilibrium is reached.
So long as exporting wheat is legal, no. Producers will preferentially export at high prices over selling domestically at low prices until the US supply is sufficiently depleted and US prices rise to match world prices.
You mean there’s a slim chance we can stop paying US farmers to NOT produce food???
God Bless Putin!!!!!
While I’m calling bullshit, please allow me to donate 3-4 hair dryers to some Ukranian commandos who can sneak across the border into Russia. Then they can turn them all on at once and take down the entire electrical grid. How many weeks into this and not one commando attack inside Russia’s borders.
JESUS H CHRIST… Putin could not have done more to telegraph the invasion for months now… ya think a plan about fighting back dirty might have come up????
You fail to mention that aside from crops, Russia provide about 30% of Europe’s fertilizer.
This could provide discomfort in the US, but we will get through. The problem is that this could tear apart the EU.
What good is the EU other than as a dictatorial human rights abuser? It’s almost as if the GOAL of the EU is to DESTROY all the Countries in it!
The EU is about to reduce their carbon foot print and will fight climate change…. for reals. I salute them.
I LOVE the fact that THEY are all going to participate.
If the US couldn’t import ANYTHING I suspect we would survive at least as well as any other country, and quite likely better. Yes, this would mean some worthless f*cks might have to get off their asses and work if they want to eat, but I don’t see this as a bad thing.