by Despite the term “sovereign nation” the United States, and nearly every other nation on the globe, has become a puppet on the strings of a global economy. The true power belongs to the producers, the exporters, and their allies. Today we are going to evaluate Russia’s foothold in the global food supply chain, what it will mean for Americans, and how we can insulate ourselves from the impending shock wave.
Russia and it’s close partners are responsible for 51.2% of global rice production, 40.6% of global wheat production, and 25.7% of global corn production. In addition to these figures, Russia is the largest global exporter of both fuel and fertilizer, two elements essential to global industrial food production.
When I cite “Russia’s close partners” I am referring the Belarus, China, and India. We cannot evaluate Russia’s position in the global food supply chain without considering the extremely close ties between these 4 countries. Though small, Belarus is joined to Russia in the “Union State” and together they supply 40% of Potash fertilizer supply worldwide. While there is no formal alliance between China and Russia, these two countries “currently enjoy the best relations they have had since the late 1950s… they have an informal agreement to coordinate diplomatic and economic moves, and build up an alliance against the United States.” (wikipedia). As for India, it cites a position of neutrality between Russia and the West, however India draws heavily on Russia for it’s arms and fuel supply, and just 3 days ago hosted the Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov .
(insert aljazeer clip)
Rice, wheat, and corn are the three primary global food crops. Russia, India, and China produce 40.6% of the global wheat supply. In fact, when Russia began it’s bombardment of the Ukraine, the price of wheat hit historic highs and, for a short time, a wheat based ETF (Teacrium) ran out of shares to sell. (Business Insider) According to an article by Business Insider: “Combined, Russia and Ukraine are responsible for more than 20% of the world’s wheat production.” China and India produce an additional 31%, meaning that half of the world supply of wheat is hanging in the balance as war rages in the Ukraine.
China and India are responsible for 50% of global rice supply. While Russia does not produce significant amounts of rice within it’s own borders, it’s relations with India and China make Russian access to the commodity far more secure than that of the Western world.
When it comes to Corn, China produces 22% of global supply. While a minimal amount of corn is harvested within Russian borders, this is where we pivot to Russia’s control of fertilizer supply.
Crops (whether wheat, corn, or rice) will not grow without a sufficient amount of the fertilizers nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium (otherwise known as potash). According to fastcompany.com: “Russia’s biggest exports are oil and gas. But the country is also the largest global exporter of fertilizer” The Union State (which I previously mentioned is Russia and Belarus) is the worlds largest producer-exporter of potash. In fact, their production accounts for 40% of global supply.
According to an article on Bloomberg.com: “Replacing [the Potash supplied by Russia and Belarus] would take nearly half a decade at the very best, and in some cases prove nearly impossible as Russia is a large source of mineral deposits found in few other global locations,” Maxwell said.”
While I advocate for organic over chemical fertilizer, our reliance on chemical nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium is severe. Completely removing this chemical fertilization from our food system would trigger a worldwide famine.
Touching fertilizers very briefly: Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium are essential to producing the crops we rely on for food. Chemical version of these elements artificially stimulate natural processes, producing plant growth while depleting the soil of minerals and organic matter. Using chemical fertilizer is like spending money on a credit card. You can get a lot with it, but eventually have to pay for it. Our soil is going deeper into debt every year. Like paying off a debt, the process of restoring true soil health will take years, if not decades.
The bottom line here is that chemical inputs remain a necessary evil to maintain status quo in the global food supply chain.
But to transition into a third global foothold, Russia is the world’s largest exporter of natural gas. Russia exports an equivalent of 53 million gallons per year. The US falls second at roughly 40 million gallons per year. In modern agriculture, fuel is as essential to farming as fertilizer. Without it the machinery that drives industrial agriculture (tractors, combines, etc) become obsolete. Additionally, “Russia accounts for about 40 percent of the European Unions entire gas consumption.” (aljazeera). Unlike the US, many of these EU countries do not have the capacity to replace Russian fuel supply with their own natural gas.
In an article from CNBC German Finance Minister Christian Lindner stated:
“While some nations are supportive of banning Russian energy, other EU countries argue that they are too dependent on Russian energy and they would hurt their own economies more than Russia’s. We have to put more pressure on Putin and we have to isolate Russia — we have to cut all economic relationships to Russia, but at the moment it is not possible to cut the gas supplies,”
What does international volatility mean for the American consumer? Simply: food prices will continue to go up. If the US or the EU takes any significant measures against Russia (which, given the aforementioned, would be more risky than either are willing to do), we could see unbelievable food inflation over the next two years. (cite corn and wheat elevation in recent weeks) Speaking from a personal perspective I do not believe a rate of 20-30% would be out of the question.
But what are our actionable steps? What are the things you and I can do to insulate ourselves from this impending shockwave? Food is going to become very expensive for Americans, and severely limited in many developing nations. Before Russia’s action in the Ukraine, there were several global and systemic factors pushing us toward this situation… and now we are facing a potential fast-track.
As individuals, we need to facilitate an inversion. Today we have a shrinking number of farmers producing food on a massive scale. We need a massive amount of farmers producing food on a small scale. Organic alternatives to chemical fertilizer (💩) work famously on a grass based protein production model. In other words, cow, sheep, goat, and chicken manure are phenomenal organic sources of nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium. On a rotational grazing system these animals can rapidly restore soil fertility while providing cheeseburgers, lamb chops, and chicken nuggets for the small farmer and his customers.
The comment invariably comes through “Well, that kind of agriculture can’t feed the world!” And my answer is: We aren’t responsible for feeding the world. We are responsible for feeding ourselves, our families and our neighbors. If everyone took that responsibility seriously, we may not need to worry about how to feed the world, it may well feed itself.
If you have no idea what I am talking about, I want to invite you to #1 watch the other 100 videos on my channel that discuss regenerative meat production and #2 buy this book at shopshepherdess.com, it will show you how to take a piece of land produce food using nothing but the grass growing on it.
-the Shepherdess
Further reads and citations:
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/04/eus-new-russia-sanctions-steel-luxury-goods-jet-fuel-and-more.html
https://www.agriculture.com/news/business/its-costing-more-to-farm-usda-study-shows
https://video.foxbusiness.com/v/6301747266001#sp=show-clips
https://www.dalinternationalreview.com/2021/03/countries-that-love-indonesia.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China%E2%80%93Russia_relations
I have been telling people for a some time now that small farms NEED to come back for this world to work.
God makes this happen in the Millennium Kingdom and the way I read God’s word he did not want “Big” farms to become a thing, Big farms are a thing WE made out of greed and control.
There are so many things wrong today with how farming is, I am very anti chemical all around and I believe in using what God made and told us to use for out good. God does not tell us something to hinder us but to help us and keep us safe.
I really liked the answer you gave: (quote) We aren’t responsible for feeding the world. We are responsible for feeding ourselves, our families and our neighbors. If everyone took that responsibility seriously, we may not need to worry about how to feed the world, it may well feed itself.
This screams God is in control more than anything else.
I have had a hard time explaining to people why I believe small farms NEED to come back, mainly I am faced with this question and now I can answer that and be able to express these facts better.
People fear food shortage, Biggest thing wrong is fear.
Chemical fertilizer is a ticking time bomb that people have built off of and here soon that bomb will go “CA-BOOM”
The Bible explains all this so I am not surprised at all, I am just sad that more people do not see it, I am sad people do not relay on God anymore. What good has that done?
I myself believe that if small farms came back people would for one as you said feed themselves and two you would be rid of the nasty chemical fertilizers till the world relapsed back to this state.
But the problem that comes to my mind is how would small farmers pop up.
There is so much land held by BIG farms so land is hard to find, Also you have the market problem for small farms VS Big farms and prices can not be competitive between the two.
The only way I see it would be to have a full shutdown of EVERYTHING, Not the stupid “Reset” jarbo being pushed, but some how make small farms able to come back.
But you would also have to have people that want to farm and today there are next to 0 kids wanting to become farmers, so more or less this Idea of more small farms is DOOMED.
As a 21 year old people think I am Crazy to try and run a farm/butcher house, But God told me to do this So I very well be doing it.
Sin has taken it’s hold and as my teacher/pastor says ” Sin will take as far as you let it take you ” and this world is on a train track to Hell, I think what is the most sad is that living here watching this all happening and being powerless ( besides Prayer ) to do anything about it.
Super good post and I can not wait to see more.