Getting Grains out of Ukraine and into the LATAM Region

The conflict in Ukraine has had significant regional and global implications, including strained relations between Russia and the West, economic sanctions, and increased militarization in the region. The war in Ukraine continues to affect countries, especially those that highly depend on grains. As of January 2023, over 18 million tonnes of grain and other foodstuffs have been exported via the Black Sea Grain Initiative. Ukraine’s Deputy Foreign Minister, Andrij Melnyk, says they are working on getting this region to be part of the initiative.

Andrij Melnyk, Deputy Foreign Minister, Ukraine: “We have been discussing with foreign minister with his team here in Belize how to facilitate, how to make possible that country like Belize, like Central American states could further receive food products from Ukraine and from Europe and you don’t have to pay a higher price for that so that’s one of the challenges that we face. The problem is that Ukraine has always been as you know one of the biggest producers of not just grain but most agriculture products we have top five or ten in most of them and the problem is that our export routes have been blocked completely at the beginning now we are trying to deblock our ports, our sea ports and that is one impediment and we have started a program a couple months of go that is called Grain from Ukraine to help countries that have been suffering because of rising prices and inflation foremost in Africa that was the initial goal of Ukraine. So we are being ourselves a victim but we still we wish to reach out to countries that have been suffering and one of the topics that we discussed with his excellency Foreign Minister Courtenay was that we can try to expand that program also to this region because we could not export all the grain, we could export until now just a small portion it is not possible to do it on the railway, on land via EU but still we are looking at possibilities and that is one of the options that how we would like also to thank to our partners for this strong political support because we can not just finish the war but ensure that a new war will not break out after that if we don’t make rules or new rules on the national scale to prevent a new war.”

The conflict remains unresolved, with ongoing violence and political tensions, making it a continued concern for international observers.