Ukraine’s Grain Could Soon Move Freely Into the EU Once Again
5 EU member states recently banned grain imports from Ukraine after protests from local farmers following a chain of events. In 2021, Ukraine exported 44.9 million tonnes of grain. Around 90% was shipped from the country’s Black Sea ports until a Russian naval blockade brought them to a standstill. By May 2022, 25 million tonnes of grain was stuck in Ukraine. That month the EU opened up road and rail routes into its member states bordering Ukraine – Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Hungary. 10.3 million tonnes of grain were exported via these ‘solidarity lanes’ in 2022, a huge rise on the previous year’s total of 27,800 tonnes. The grain was supposed to transit through Ukraine’s neighbours to be sold in other EU countries or further afield. But bottlenecks trapped millions of tonnes inside the countries instead. This huge influx of cheap grain forced down prices, damaging the livelihoods of local farmers.
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