The UN calls on all stakeholders to work to remove barriers to Russia’s food and fertilizer exports. Such a statement was made on Friday, January 13, by the Deputy Secretary General of the world organization Rosemary DiCarlo at a meeting of the UN Security Council (SC).
“Export [данной продукции] is a key factor in keeping prices down and addressing food security concerns. We call on all stakeholders to work on this task,” she said.
In addition, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, US Permanent Representative to the World Organization, said during the meeting that, allegedly due to Russia’s slowdown in inspections, dozens of ships are waiting to be sent and dozens more are waiting for inspection, thus operations are not keeping up with the high global demand for Black Sea grain. Thomas-Greenfield stressed that the delay is 2.5 million tons of grain.
At the moment, the world’s demand for grain supplied by the Black Sea is not covered in full. In this regard, she called on the Russian side to immediately strengthen cooperation on the grain deal.
Earlier in the day, Russian Ambassador to Turkey Alexei Yerkhov said there was no progress in the implementation of the memorandum of understanding between Russia and the UN on the normalization of Russian agricultural exports. According to him, Russian manufacturers and suppliers are still facing blocked bank payments, insurance fees and blocked access to ports. Yerkhov added that it is only Kyiv that prevents the resumption of ammonia supplies.
As Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on December 31, 16 million tons of products were exported from Ukraine in 2022 as part of a grain deal.
Prior to that, on December 26, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that to date, the problem with the export of fertilizers from Russia has not been fully resolved, while there is significant progress in this matter. He pointed out that both Moscow itself and Turkey, together with the UN, are taking steps to start exporting Russian fertilizers.
The food deal was concluded on July 22 in Istanbul. Then Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and UN Secretary General António Guterres signed a memorandum on facilitating the supply of Russian agricultural products and fertilizers to world markets. At the same time, the Ukrainian delegation signed an agreement with Turkey and the UN on the export of grain.
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