Ukraine war and the global food system

The briefing examines the impact of the Russia-Ukraine conflict on global food security, noting that the two nations provide 12% of global calories. It highlights how port blockades and fertiliser export suspensions have driven up prices and hunger, particularly in Africa and the Middle East. The document warns that protectionist export bans by countries like India and Argentina are exacerbating the crisis, and argues that increasing cropland to compensate is problematic due to the associated fossil fuel and fertiliser requirements.

• Russia and Ukraine are critical to global food security, together providing 12% of global calories and significant shares of globally-traded wheat (28%), barley (29%), corn (15%), and sunflower oil (75%).
• The conflict has severely impacted Ukrainian agricultural production, with estimates suggesting 30%-50% of wheat fields will not be planted this year and 20%-30% of winter cereals, maize, and sunflower seeds will not be harvested in the 2022/2023 season.
• The war is significantly increasing global hunger, with the UN estimating up to 13 million more people could go hungry. The number of severely food insecure people is expected to rise to 323 million in 2022 from 276 million at the start of the year.
• African nations are particularly vulnerable due to high import dependency; Somalia, Senegal, and Egypt rely on Russia and Ukraine for 50% to 100% of their wheat, while Eritrea sources all of its wheat from them.
• Protectionist measures, such as wheat export bans in India and chicken export halts in Malaysia, are intensifying the crisis. Current restrictions affect 17.3% of total calories traded globally, a scale greater than during the 2007/08 food crisis.
• Efforts to increase food production by expanding cropland, suggested by the US, EU, Canada, Ireland, and Mexico, may be counterproductive as the required increase in fertilisers and fossil fuels could exacerbate biodiversity loss and climate change.

APA

Team, Z. (2022). Ukraine war and the global food system. Zero Carbon Analytics. https://zerocarbon-analytics.org/nature/ukraine-war-and-the-global-food-system/

Chicago

Team, ZCA. Ukraine war and the global food system. Zero Carbon Analytics, 2022. https://zerocarbon-analytics.org/nature/ukraine-war-and-the-global-food-system/.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Team |first1=ZCA |title=Ukraine war and the global food system |publisher=Zero Carbon Analytics |date=15 August 2022 |url=https://zerocarbon-analytics.org/nature/ukraine-war-and-the-global-food-system/ |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{team2022ukraine, author = {Team, ZCA}, title = {{Ukraine war and the global food system}}, institution = {Zero Carbon Analytics}, year = {2022}, month = aug, url = {https://zerocarbon-analytics.org/nature/ukraine-war-and-the-global-food-system/}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }