russia doubles grain exports so far 2023, persists in questioning Ukraine grain corridor effectiveness
Grain exports from russia have doubled since the start of 2023, while russia keeps claiming that the grain deal is not working effectively, says the Permanent Representative of Ukraine to the United Nations Sergiy Kyslytsya, Ukrinform reports.
"It is abhorrent that russia is still pretending that it is losing in this deal. I don't have to remind the Security Council of the immorality of such complaints from the aggressor state, which has been and remains the only threat to food supplies in the Black Sea," Sergiy Kyslytsya said.
The head of the Institute for Strategic Black Sea Studies, Andriy Klymenko, shared statistics on russian exports for 2022 and January-April 2023 on Facebook:
- grain cargo turnover at russian seaports increased by 6.4% in 2022 compared to 2021 and totalled 45.1 million tons
- mineral fertiliser turnover increased by 25.1% to 24.2 million tons in 2022
- grain transshipment in russian ports in January-April 2023 increased by 2.1x to 22.4 million tons
- transshipment of mineral fertilisers in January-April 2023 increased by 1.7x to 10.5 million tons
"So, we consider these speculations to be an attempt to conceal russia's deliberate actions aimed at using food supplies as a weapon, and we call on the international community to give a resolute response," Kyslytsya added.
russia stresses that the Black Sea Grain Initiative may be renewed for another 60 days for the last time. The grain deal expires on May 18.
Since the opening of the grain corridor on August 1, 2022, the Black Sea Grain Initiative has enabled the export of more than 30,25 mln t of Ukrainian agri-food commodities worldwide.
