Grain Ships Burning in Black Sea May Foreshadow Hunger in Global South

Americans, distracted by the Strait of Hormuz, overlook uncontrolled naval warfare that now paralyzes shipping through the Black Sea, “the Persian Gulf of grain.” Rivers of grain flow from the black earth belt of Russia and Ukraine. They keep food prices low for North African populations unable to feed themselves.One third of the world’s traded grain — barley, corn, and wheat — reaches the world through the ports of the Black Sea and its neighbor, the Sea of Azov. Main destinations include Algeria Tunisia, Egypt, Turkey, and Yemen. Now, at peak harvest time, Russian and Ukrainian farmers find that war has closed Black Sea ports. While the world focuses on high oil prices, wheat prices spiked by 17 percent over the last month. Driving prices upwards is one of the largest — and most widely ignored — naval battles of modern history. In July, one Ukrainian unit, the Unmanned Systems Force, claims to have sunk or damaged 201 Russian vessels, 129 in the Sea of Azov and 72 in the Black Sea. Many of these vessels now drift like ghost ships.By flying explosive drones into ship bridges, Ukraine seeks “to turn every self-propelled vessel into a barge drifting in the sea, blind and deaf,” the Unmanned Systems commander, Rober Brovdi, posted on Telegram. “The goal is not to pollute the water area with oil slicks, so no holes.”“Russia And Ukraine Are Wiping Out Each Other’s Shipping,” American military affairs writer David Axe headlined an analysis last week. “Unrestricted naval warfare on the Black Sea.” Draining Russia’s black earth lands, a canal system links the Volga with the Azov, which in turn connects to the Black Sea. As the surviving half of Russia’s Azov civilian fleet huddles in ports, Russia mulls arming cargo ships with machine guns, missile launchers, armor plates, and anti-drone nets.For their part, the Russians say they have heavily bombed Ukraine’s Odesa region ports, cutting grain-loading capacity by one third and hitting about 20 cargo ships. Visible from Odesa city, Russian cruise missiles hit the vessel Golden Leo on July 19, killing 10 crew members. This was the largest civilian loss of life from a ship attack in the four and a half years of war. One week later, the ship rolled over and sank.“Systematic attacks that began in July could soon lead to a complete blockage of export corridors in the Black Sea basin,” Russia’s Union of Grain Exporters and Producers said Friday in a statement sent to Reuters. The trade group warned that Russian wheat exports could plummet this season by 35 million tons, 15 percent of total global wheat trade.“Disruptions to shipping in the Black Sea caused by Ukrainian attacks on dry cargo vessels and port infrastructure pose a direct threat to global food security,” the statement added.For the last three weeks, shipping from the Sea of Azov, which previously handled up to a quarter of Russian grain exports, has been halted due to drone attacks. To counter, Russia offers to pay 90 percent of shipping costs to send grain from southern Russia to the nation’s Baltic ports.Ukraine’s increasingly deadly long range drones could soon render the Baltic unsafe for Russian cargo ships as well. On Sunday, Russia’s Navy Day, President Vladimir Putin canceled the traditional naval parade down the Neva River; instead, due to drone threats, a barge pulled a raft covered with toy sailors down the river. Mr. Putin marked the day safely inside the Main Admiralty building. There, he reviewed sailors parading in front of a photograph of a submarine.In the Black Sea, as Ukraine’s $50,000 missiles take out $5 million Russian cargo ships, few owners want to risk their vessels. Insurance coverage has dried up. After Ukrainian missiles hit three Greek-operated ships in the Black Sea, Greece’s shipping ministry warned ship owners about entering the area.For Ukraine, shipping companies last week stopped sending cargo ships leek ast wto the three big ports of Odesa region. Normally, these ports are responsible for 90 percent of Ukraine’s food exports. Some grain can leave Ukraine by rail and from two river ports on the Danube, but Europe’s drought has lowered water levels in the Danube, cutting river shipping. Ukraine’s Black Sea attacks also are tightening the world oil market, helping to push up gasoline prices this summer for American drivers. Kazakhstan, historically the world’s 10th largest oil exporter, has cut oil production in half. The cut follows Ukrainian attacks on tankers loading at Russia’s Black Sea port of Novorossiysk, the only oil export terminal for the land-locked Central Asian nation.Tightening the world gasoline market, Ukraine’s unrelenting drone attacks against Russia’s oil refineries have cut Russia’s gasoline production capacity in half, according to new calculations by the Financial Times. With refinery repairs months away, air defenses failing, and drivers spending hours in gas lines, the Kremlin recently imposed a six-month ban on exports of gasoline and diesel. In the current tit-for-tat phase of the war, Russia bombed hundreds of Ukrainian gas stations in July. Russia long ago knocked offline Ukraine’s lone oil refinery.Desperate to shorten gas lines, Russia, the world’s third largest oil producer, now imports gasoline from Belarus and India. Also, it is in talks with Kazakhstan to have it refine Russian oil and to return the refined products to Russia. The proposal came last week when Mr. Putin visited Omsk, a city 50 miles north of Kazakhstan. Two weeks earlier, Ukrainian drones flew an estimated 1,600 miles and knocked off line much of the oil refinery in Omsk, the largest in Russia.Mr. Putin apparently made progress on an oil refining deal in closed door talks with the Kazakh president, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev. One price Mr. Putin paid was to endure a public appeal by the Kazakh leader for Russia to “freeze this conflict” and start serious negotiations. Speaking in fluent Russian on live TV, Mr. Tokayev told Mr. Putin to his face: “It is a shame, young people are dying. … This must be brought to an end.”Last week, President Trump met in Washington with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine. Mr. Trump promised to restart his push for peace talks. To that end, his chief negotiators, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, are expected to make this month their first ever trip to Kyiv. Over the last 18 months, Mr. Witkoff has made eight trips to Russia.The decision to finally make the 11-hour train ride from eastern Poland to Kyiv seems to reflect Mr. Trump’s belief that Ukraine now has the edge in the war. Adding urgency to peace talks are the mountains of corn and wheat expandinggrowing at export terminals in Russia and Ukraine. Hunger and food riots may not be far off in the chronically unstable countries of North Africa.“Russia is systematically dismantling the corridor that feeds the Global South,” Ukrainian-Canadian analyst Michael Bociurkiw wrote from Odesa after watching the bombing of the Golden Leo. “Egypt — which increased its purchases of Ukrainian wheat by nearly 83 percent last season to become its biggest buyer —- Algeria, Indonesia, and famine-wracked Yemen are the customers on the other end of these burning ships.”

Grain Ships Burning in Black Sea May Foreshadow Hunger in Global South

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