The other day the Ministry of Defense announced that it had closed the green passage for grain export from Ukraine.
A bit later Vladimir Putin confirmed that Russia suspends its participation in the so-called “grain deal”.
Formally, the reason for that was the attack of the armed
forces of Ukraine at the ships and port infrastructure in Sevastopol.
For some reason it was called a terrorist attack, though the attack was performed by military ships.
The exit from the grain deal cancels the only big diplomatic success of the global community during the war.
Now, the question of food deficit is acute for the whole planet again, and for some countries it means even hunger.
And once again there is a question – why does Russia need it, actually?
Today we’ll try to understand why the grain deal is important for all the participants, why the suspension really happened
and what it will change and won’t be able to change in the world and in the front?
While we were making this video, the Ministry of Defense announced that Russia resumes its participation in the grain
deal and won’t prevent the Ukrainian ships with food from moving through the Black Sea.
However, we still need to discuss why those suspensions and threats were necessary and what will be the result of it.
FOOD CRISIS
Several months ago, we had a very detailed video about what led the world to the hunger threat.
Please, have a look if you haven’t seen it yet.
Even before the war the experts predicted big problems that the poorest countries might have food shortage in 2022.
In particular, the countries of Africa and Asia.
And as if it wasn’t enough, one biggest grain supplier decided to attack another biggest grain supplier.
Altogether Russia and Ukraine covered 30% of global grain demand and 75% of demand for sunflower and sunflower oil.
And suddenly, Russia started bombing the main agricultural regions of Ukraine and occupied thousands
of hectares of agricultural land, millions of the Ukrainians left their homes and villages, many of them died,
many of them joined the army.
The huge part of the crop wasn’t collected at all or was occupied, besides, in the beginning of the war the Russian
fleet took control over the Black Sea coast, blocking all the Ukrainian ports shipping grain to Europe and Africa.
Those were “Odessky”, “Chernomorsky” and “Yuzhny” ports. Moreover, sanctions of the western countries played its role.
It doesn’t even matter if the specific restrictions concerned agriculture or not.
The western countries refused to deal with the Russian ships and banks, or provide its ships and insure them.
As a result, the grain export failed not just in Ukraine, but in Russia too.
And here we should add drought and bad crops in Southern Europe.
It looked literally like that – a person who had been in isolation and had coronavirus, went in the morning to buy bread,
but one baker attacked the other one, destroying its counters, and preventing the delivery cars from leaving the place.
The attacker himself can’t sell anything because the whole town is boycotting him.
The prices increased, the world started discussing the impending hunger and the necessity of the food deal.
And such a deal happened in the beginning of summer – on June 22.
Russia and Ukraine signed the agreements with the UN and Turkey simultaneously that the Russian
fleet will stop blocking ships with Ukrainian grain in the Black Sea.
It’s clear why the world and the UN in particular need it – to prevent hunger and calm the food market
down and help Ukraine, and also, to prove its significance in global politics, I haven’t called the grain deal the main
diplomatic success of the war for nothing. It’s almost the only success at all.
The UN was created exactly to solve problems like this.
And, well, to prevent wars like this, but there was no success here. It's clear why Ukraine needs it too.
The country needs money desperately.
Under different estimations the Ukraine economy lacks 35-40% of GDP this year.
Those are huge numbers! Of course, the whole world helps Ukraine – it gives loans, supplies weapons, accepts refugees.
But it doesn’t cancel the increase of expenses in wartime – they increase really fast.
Therefore, Ukraine desperately needs those billions of dollars for grain.
Moreover, there is a problem of overfilled grain stocks.
If they don’t sell the old crop, there will be nowhere to store the new one, so the crop will rot,
and there will be additional losses.
As soon as the deal was profitable for Ukraine, it might look like the Russian government shouldn’t have allowed it.
Why should they help the enemy they can’t defeat in the front all along? But in fact, it’s quite easy.
There are 4 reasons why this deal is profitable for Russia itself.
First, before the deal Russia couldn’t earn money for grain though the prices increased right before their eyes.
The deal should have mitigated the informal restrictions and the attitude of private companies towards
Russian agricultural products, in 2021 the Russian budget received 11 billion for selling grain.
Of course, it can’t be compared to 100 billion for gas, but still. Second, the grain deal gave propaganda powerful arguments.
Look, we are for anything good and against anything bad. We are saving the world from hunger.
Third, the Kremlin has no more allies left, so they are trying not to quarrel with those who are at least neutral.
The countries of Middle East and Northern Africa have expressed their concern about the food crisis
and social turmoil it might cause since March. Like it was during the Arab Spring.
And fourth, without selling its own grain, not only the Russian budget is losing money,
but also those whom Putin’s regime is worried about most of all.
The biggest food suppliers from Russia are connected with the families of Lavrov, Medvedev, Patrushev
and the ex-Minister of Agriculture Tkachev.
We can also note the profit for Turkey.
It doesn’t just earn reputation points becoming a platform for Russia-Ukraine negotiations for the second time.
And it’s very important for Erdogan who doesn’t want to look like a villain like Vladimir Putin
and win his next year election peacefully.
Besides, Turkey also earns money on processing and further shipment of grain.
CANCELING THE DEAL
Like I said, the formal reason for the suspension of Russia’s participation was the attack of the Ukrainian army at military
ships in Sevastopol which the Russian propagandists call a terror act for some reason.
But the Russian government and Putin personally threatened in September to close the Black Sea again.
Then the President said that they had lied to us, and the Ukrainian grain went to Europe
instead of the poorest countries.
It’s not true. Here are infographics proving where the Ukrainian ships went to.
One third to Europe, one third to Asia and Africa and one third to Turkey where grain is processed
and shipped throughout the whole region.
Anyway, the statement like “You don’t give enough bread to the poorest countries, so,
we won’t give you to ship anything” sounds weird.
The more successful the Ukrainian army is at the front, the more aces Putin’s regime uses to make the West
stop helping Ukraine or make it negotiate.
Mobilization, nuclear threats, energy infrastructure attacks, gas supplies suspension and now hunger blackmail –
all that are the links of one chain.
All that should scare the humankind so much that they will forget about all their laws and principles and allow Russia
to do to Ukraine whatever it wants and stop supplying weapons and intelligence data.
The deal was coming to its end anyway, it had to live just 3 weeks.
The Kremlin wasn’t going to extend it. And Russia has lost the status of a trustworthy supplier because of the war.
Even after the deal the western countries didn’t rush to buy Russian grain – the Russian economy is too toxic, you know.
It means Russia has earned less money than expected.
And they earned part of it selling the grain literally stolen from Ukraine.
Money loss is not critical for Russia, especially when dollars and euros for oil and gas keep coming.
Moreover, the cancellation is not permanent, like other Putin’s threats.
Russia didn’t cancel the deal totally, it just suspended it.
Ships with grain can’t go, but Turkey announced that the ships with Turkish national colors will keep moving.
The Russian power always tries to make room for moving backwards and bargaining with the West.
But unlike Russia, Ukraine earned quite a bit for the last three months and spent everything for the offensive needs.
The grain blackmailing has two disadvantages for Russia.
Those relatively neutral countries might refuse being so neutral now because this grain deal is essential for them.
Russia might quarrel with partners in Africa, Turkey and Saudi Arabia.
The list of countries who refuse not just to talk but even to be in one room
with the Russian officials is becoming shorter rapidly.
And the biggest disadvantage of a threatening strategy is that threats stop working at some point.
WHY WON’T THE BLACKMAIL WORK?
Russia isn’t an acknowledged terrorist government.
So, the western logic “we don’t negotiate with terrorists” doesn’t work in case of Russia.
Of course, they keep negotiating but they make it clear that they won’t compromise dealing with the Kremlin.
There have been too many compromises with Putin since the annexation of the Crimea.
All those compromises resulted in the first frontal war in Europe for 75 years.
Almost everyone understands now that it’s impossible to make a deal with Putin or pacify him.
Even if they compromise now – take the sanctions off or stop supplying new weapons to Ukraine trying to cancel
the grain blockade – everyone understands that the Russian government will want more.
If it collects enough power, it will try to take all the territories they announced to be Russian.
Then they will remember about Nikolaev and Odessa, Kyiv, Moldova, the Baltic countries, Poland, and here we go again.
Then Russia will forget about all the agreements at once, block all the ports, attack the civilian districts and will threaten
the whole world with nuclear war demanding something new.
Yes, the Western countries suffer losses. But those losses are temporary.
Global economy will recover after the war, like it did after every crisis – its safety margin is quite impressive.
It just needs the war to stop as soon as possible, and it will happen when Ukraine wins.
Yes, hunger in the poorest countries is a huge problem and it must be solved.
The Russian power has lost all the international reputation it had, and no one will trust it now.
The West can help Ukraine to get its grain business back in a different way – they can give Ukraine weapons so that they
could get their ports back, it’s a more effective strategy than compromising with Putin who has started all of this.
Until now, the West’s only response to the Kremlin’s threats was new weapons and money supplies to Ukraine.
The success of the Ukrainian offensive showed them that it wasn’t in vain. We’ll see what will happen this time.
Till tomorrow!