A world summit on food security is currently underway in Rome. One of its main topics is the situation in the Russian agricultural sector and in the former USSR. The safeguarding and strengthening of food security is one of the top priorities of Russia’s agricultural policy. Russia’s Ministry of Agriculture has worked out a draft for food security doctrine, which is aimed at self-sufficiency, which means that this country must satisfy its needs for high-quality agricultural products at the level of not less than 80 to 90 per cent of its total need.
Today Russia is ranks among 3 leading exporters of grain on the world market. The day before “The Financial Times” of London, with a reference to the latest assessments of the Russian agricultural potential that were made by the World Bank, reported that Russia has all the necessary conditions to increase the export of grain in the coming 15 years 2-fold and bring it to 40 to 50 million tons. Russia can provide for approximately 450 million people. Russia’s contribution to the world food basket may increase considerably. Russia’s wheat is competitive with the grain of the leading producers — such as the USA and Canada, meaning both the quality and price, stresses the Head of the Duma Committee on Agriculture Valentin Denisov.
In recent years we’ve reached high volumes of grain production, which could be incorporated into the segment of humanitarian programmes the United Nations is tackling now. A proposal was made to set up an agency, taking as a model the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), which would regulate the world grain market. Deplorably, nobody is waiting for us with our grain there. Because it has already been divided between the current suppliers of grain, Valeri Remin says.
Some time ago Russia came up with the initiative to set up a Black Sea grain pool with the participation of Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Russia, to influence the world market far more strongly. However, Ukraine quitted the talks, and now we’re thinking what should be done for the resumption of the talks. The problem of starvation is urgent enough in the world today, though the progress in finding a solution to this problem is clearly visible. In recent decades China, India and some other countries have resolved their food problem and even began to export food products. This problem still exists though, especially in Africa, where due to ethnic and political conflicts and also due to ecological disasters, quantity of food production has gone down considerably. And Russia with its potential in the field of production can promote the settlement of this problem.
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