Implementation Of Grain Initiative Facilitating Fall In Global Food Prices - Kubrakov

Ukraine’s Minister of Infrastructure Oleksandr Kubrakov has said that the implementation of the Black Sea Grain Initiative that established a humanitarian maritime corridor to allow ships to export grain and other foodstuffs from Ukraine is facilitating a fall in global food prices. 

The Ukrainian Ministry of Infrastructure announced this in a statement, the CFTS portal reports. 

In particular, the Food Price Index of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (the FAO Food Price Index) was 138 points at the end of August, 2% down from July and 13.6% down from its peak in March this year. 

"Almost 5 million tons of agricultural products have already been shipped from the ports of Greater Odesa since the beginning of the implementation of the Grain Initiative. Thanks to these volumes, not only are global food prices falling, but the humanitarian situation in those countries where people are on the verge of starvation, particularly in Ethiopia and Yemen, is improving. We continue to cooperate actively with the UN to ensure that the initiative works not only as an economic tool, but also as a tool for stabilizing the humanitarian situation in the world," Kubrakov said. 

According to the Ukrainian minister of infrastructure, Ukraine, the European Union, and Moldova continue to implement the "Ukraine-EU Solidarity Lanes" initiative, which provides for the development of logistics routes for exporting Ukrainian agricultural products as an alternative to seaports. 

"Together with our international partners, we are taking all the available opportunities to minimize the damage to global food security caused by Russia’s full-scale invasion," he said. 

The FAO Food Price Index was 145.2 points at the end of August, which is 1.4% down from July and 14.6% down from March this year. 

The FAO Food Price Index is a measure of the monthly change in the international prices of a basket of food commodities. In particular, the index consists of the average of five commodity group price indices (the FAO meat, dairy, cereal, vegetable oil, and sugar price indices) weighted by the average export shares of each of the groups over 2014-2016.