Putin Says World Faces Food Crisis Due to West’s Sanctions

Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting with the head of the Republic of Ingushetia Makhmud-Ali Kalimatov at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia March 30, 2022. (Reuters)
Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting with the head of the Republic of Ingushetia Makhmud-Ali Kalimatov at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia March 30, 2022. (Reuters)
TT

Putin Says World Faces Food Crisis Due to West’s Sanctions

Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting with the head of the Republic of Ingushetia Makhmud-Ali Kalimatov at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia March 30, 2022. (Reuters)
Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting with the head of the Republic of Ingushetia Makhmud-Ali Kalimatov at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia March 30, 2022. (Reuters)

President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that Russia must keep a close eye on its food exports to hostile countries because the West's sanctions had fomented a global food crisis and spiraling energy prices.

The West's sanctions over Putin's Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine have tipped Russia towards its worst economic crisis since the 1991 fall of the Soviet Union, though Moscow says the global impact of the sanctions could be much more significant.

The Kremlin chief cautioned that higher energy prices combined with a shortage of fertilizers would prompt the West to print money to buy up supplies, leading to food shortages among poorer countries.

"They will inevitably exacerbate food shortages in the poorest regions of the world, spur new waves of migration and in general drive food prices even higher," Putin told a meeting on developing food production.

"In these current conditions, a shortage of fertilizers on the global market is inevitable," Putin said. "We will have to be more careful about food supplies abroad, especially carefully monitor the exports to countries which are hostile to us."

One of Putin's allies warned last week that Russia could limit supplies of agriculture products to "friendly" countries only, amid Western sanctions imposed on Moscow.

Russia is the world's largest exporter of wheat, supplying it mainly to Africa and the Middle East, and a major producer of potash, phosphate and nitrogen containing fertilizers - key crop and soil nutrients.

Russia produces more than 50 million tons a year of fertilizers, 13% of the global total. Phosagro, Uralchem, Uralkali, Acron and Eurochem are the biggest fertilizer players.

Sanctions, Putin said, had disrupted logistics for fertilizer supplies from Russia and Belarus while higher prices for natural gas was making fertilizer production more expensive in the West.

In a warning to European states, Putin warned that Moscow would respond in kind to any attempt to nationalize Russian assets, quipping that such action was a "a double-edged weapon".

Putin was speaking a day after Germany said its energy regulator would take control of Gazprom Germania, a gas trading, storage and transmission business which Russia's Gazprom said it was exiting last Friday.

The British government may decide to step in and temporarily run Russian gas giant Gazprom's British retail supply arm.

Putin says Russia's "special military operation" in Ukraine is necessary because the United States was using Ukraine to threaten Russia and Moscow had to defend Russian-speaking people in Ukraine from persecution.

Ukraine has dismissed Putin's claims of persecution and says Russia is fighting an unprovoked war of aggression.



Cuba Left Reeling after Hurricane Ravages Island

A man rides a bicycle along a flooded street after the passage of Hurricane Rafael in Batabano, Mayabeque province, Cuba, on November 7, 2024. (Photo by Yamil LAGE / AFP)
A man rides a bicycle along a flooded street after the passage of Hurricane Rafael in Batabano, Mayabeque province, Cuba, on November 7, 2024. (Photo by Yamil LAGE / AFP)
TT

Cuba Left Reeling after Hurricane Ravages Island

A man rides a bicycle along a flooded street after the passage of Hurricane Rafael in Batabano, Mayabeque province, Cuba, on November 7, 2024. (Photo by Yamil LAGE / AFP)
A man rides a bicycle along a flooded street after the passage of Hurricane Rafael in Batabano, Mayabeque province, Cuba, on November 7, 2024. (Photo by Yamil LAGE / AFP)

Cuba was left reeling Thursday after a fierce Category 3 hurricane ripped across the island, knocking out the country’s power grid, downing trees and damaging infrastructure. No fatalities were immediately reported.
Hurricane Rafael crossed a western portion of Cuba on Wednesday evening about 75 kilometers west of Havana.
Some 50,000 people took shelter in Havana, with thousands more doing the same in regions south and just west of the capital since they lived in flood zones or in flimsy homes. The main road from Havana to the southern coastal city of Batabanó was strewn with dozens of utility poles and wires.
Lázaro Guerra, electricity director for the Ministry of Energy and Mines, said power had been partially restored in the island’s western region and that generation units were powering back up. But he warned that restoring power would be slow-going as crews took safety precautions.
As Rafael plowed across Cuba on Wednesday evening it slowed to a Category 2 hurricane as it chugged into the Gulf of Mexico before heading toward Mexico, according to the National Hurricane Center in Miami.
Late Thursday morning, the hurricane was located about 200 miles (320 kilometers) west-northwest of Havana. It had maximum sustained winds of 100 mph (345 kph) and was moving west-northwest at 9 mph (15 kph).
Earlier in the week, Rafael brushed past Jamaica and battered the Cayman Islands, downing trees and power lines and unleashing heavy flooding in some areas.
Authorities in Jamaica are searching for a couple last seen inside a car that was swept away by floodwaters, police told Radio Jamaica News.
Thousands of customers in Jamaica and Little Cayman remained without power as crews worked to restore electricity after the storm.
Rafael was expected to keep weakening as it spins over open waters and heads toward northern Mexico, although the hurricane center warned there was “above average uncertainty” in the storm's future track.
Meanwhile, many Cubans were left picking up the pieces from Wednesday night, after a rocky few weeks in the Caribbean nation. In October, the island was hit by a one-two punch. First, it was hit by island-wide blackouts stretching on for days, a product of the island’s energy crisis. Shortly after, it was slapped by powerful hurricane that struck the eastern part of the island and killed at least six people.
The disasters have stoked discontent already simmering in Cuba amid an ongoing economic crisis, which has pushed many to migrate from Cuba.
Classes and public transport were suspended on parts of the island and authorities canceled flights in and out of Havana and Varadero. Thousands of people in the west of the island had been evacuated as a preventative measure.
Rafael is the 17th named storm of the season.