WORLD NEWS | UN officials hope for breakthrough in Russian food, fertilizer shipments

GENEVA, May 18 (AP) – A senior U.N. official said Thursday he hopes to achieve a breakthrough soon after months of trying to ensure that Russian food and fertilizer can go to a development struggling amid high prices. Chinese home.

Secretary-General António Guterres recently met with insurance magnate Lloyd’s, the UN humanitarian chief Martin Griffith told The Associated Press, a day after Moscow agreed to renew a wartime pact allowing Ukraine to export critical food supplies. Banks to help with insurance coverage for transport of agricultural products in Russia.

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Moscow has repeatedly complained that Western sanctions that do not target its food or fertilizers have hindered the insurance, financing and logistics of its exports. However, analysts and trade data show that Russia is sending large quantities of wheat through other ports.

U.N. deputy spokesman Farhan Haq declined to confirm whether Guterres met with Lloyd. The insurer did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

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“We are working with the private sector at all levels, including the secretary-general, to ensure that agreements” to boost Russian food and fertilizer exports are “fully implemented,” Harker said.

Last summer, the United Nations and Turkey struck two separate agreements with the warring parties: one allowing more than 30 million metric tons of Ukrainian grain to enter world markets via demilitarized sea corridors, and another aimed at easing Russian exports.

Griffiths said that despite Russia’s reservations, it agreed on Wednesday to extend the Black Sea Food Initiative because Moscow recognizes the importance of helping to strengthen global food security and drive down prices for grain, fertilizer and other agricultural products.

Countries in Africa, the Middle East and parts of Asia depend on affordable wheat, barley, vegetable oil and other foods from the Black Sea region, known as the “breadbasket of the world”.

Griffiths, the UN’s top envoy for food trade, pointed to “a range of factors” leading to Russia’s decision. He said it included the views of developing countries overwhelmingly backing the deal, including China and India, as well as Turkey’s role in helping to broker it.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who is in the midst of a difficult re-election campaign and has positioned himself as a neutral middleman, announced Russia’s extension to the deal a day earlier.

Griffiths said the meeting continued on Wednesday and that he would participate in another virtual meeting in the next day or two to “identify other commitments that we did not reach in last week’s grain talks”.

“Yesterday we saw a lot of progress,” he said on Thursday. “I hope tomorrow or the day after tomorrow, we’ll see it come to a conclusion.”

Griffiths said the talks included agreeing to export Russian ammonia, a key ingredient in fertilizer, via the Black Sea as part of a deal that has yet to be executed.

The talks will also review registration and inspections of ships bringing Ukrainian grain from its three open ports to parts of the world battling hunger, Griffith said. Both have slowed sharply in recent months and less grain has been produced.

He pointed to “a huge amount of behind-the-scenes detail work” to ensure the two agreements were implemented, which included Guterres and Rebecca Greenspan, president of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development. As the lead on the Russian side of the deal, she visited Moscow several times.

“She and her team are working hard every day and I think the secretary recently met with the head of Lloyds Bank, for example, to look at the insurance issue,” Griffith said.

Going forward, he hopes to see “significant progress” in helping Russian shipments in the coming months, “and on the specific issues now facing the Black Sea, which I hope — I think — will allow us to have a more A reliable future.” (Associated Press)

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