President Zelenskyy announced start of Ukrainian humanitarian initiative Grain from Ukraine
Photo by: Пресслужба Президента України / president.gov.ua
On Holodomor Victims Remembrance Day, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced the launch of the Grain from Ukraine initiative, aiming to provide food to poor countries in Asia and Africa. It has already raised $150 mln.
In the framework of the first International Summit on Food Security held in Kyiv on 26 November, the President noted that the Grain from Ukraine initiative emphasizes the importance of food security and the global role of Ukraine and its partners in guaranteeing this security.
"The essence of our new humanitarian initiative is very simple, transparent, very important. We plan to send at least 60 ships from Ukrainian ports to the countries most affected by the food crisis and that are in need of urgent aid. These are countries such as Ethiopia, Sudan, South Sudan, Somalia, Congo, Kenya, Yemen and others," the Head of State said.
The President reported that today more than 20 states and the European Union are financially participating in this initiative, and more than ten states are preparing to join it. He offered the partners of Ukraine to choose the form of participation in the program that would meet the existing conditions.
"I would like to remind you that food security is one of the elements of the Ukrainian peace formula. Peace for the whole world. Russian aggression hit our people, all the nations of Europe and many nations of the world. Therefore, our humanitarian initiative Grain from Ukraine, together with the current export grain initiative, is an absolutely timely and powerful response to the threat created by Russia. I believe that our joint response — Ukraine's and our partners' — will be enough to defuse the food crisis and save millions of people from hunger, and therefore dozens of countries — from social chaos," Zelenskyy said.
Zelenskyy also said that today, based on the results of the summit, a Joint Statement was adopted, which is open to the accession of other states during the entire period of operation of the Grain from Ukraine initiative.
