MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 28th January, 2023) Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Vershinin has informed the United Nations that the issue of the blocking effect of the EU and US sanctions against Russian agricultural products is unresolved despite claims to the contrary by the West, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.
On Thursday, Vershinin accompanied by representatives of Russia's various departments and companies held another round of face-to-face consultations with Rebeca Grynspan, the head of the UN Conference on Trade and Development.�
"Russia especially noted that the issue of the blocking effect of unilateral US and EU sanctions was unresolved, despite all the declarative statements by Washington, Brussels and London about the alleged non-proliferation of their restrictions on the agricultural sector," the ministry said in a statement released on Friday.
Due to disruptions in financial and transport chains caused by Western sanctions, several million tonnes of Russian fertilizers and food products were not delivered to the world market in 2022, which became one of the reasons for inflated prices in the agricultural field, primarily for ammonia, the ministry added.
"This, in turn, led to the fact that rich countries increased volume of their purchases, while poor countries faced not only the affordability crisis related to the agricultural products, but also their physical shortage," the statement read.
During the meeting, both the UN and Russian representatives expressed a common opinion that without the normalization of Russian exports of grain and fertilizers, the existing threats to global food security will continue to worsen, which runs counter to the stated goals of the Istanbul agreements, the Russian Foreign Ministry stated.
"Deliveries of Ukrainian food under the Black Sea initiative cannot solve these problems, since we are talking mainly about fodder corn and feed grains (70% of cargo), which are sent primarily to developed countries (more than 50%), with a complete absence of fertilizers," the department added.
In July 2022, Russia, Ukraine, Turkey and the United Nations struck a deal to provide a humanitarian maritime corridor for ships with food and fertilizer exports from Ukrainian Black Sea ports. However, Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly said that most of the ships carrying Ukrainian grain did not make it to the world's poorest countries and ended up in Europe. At the same time, Putin has voiced his concerns that Russian products are not entering the global markets as promised by the agreement.
