While welcoming a high-level UN panel’s recommendation to exempt the food purchases by the World Food Programme (WFP) from export restrictions, India has called for international cooperation to face the looming energy crisis sparked by the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Warning at the Security Council’s meeting on Ukraine on Thursday that “the conflict is having destabilising effect with broader regional and global implications”, India’s Permanent Representative T. S. Tirumurti pointed out that “oil prices are skyrocketing and there is shortage of food grains and fertilisers” disproportionately impacting the developing countries.
GCRG recommended last month exempting WFP food purchases from WTO restrictions and making it formal at the WTO ministerial meeting in June.
Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said, “We need quick and decisive action to ensure a steady flow of food and energy in open markets, by lifting export restrictions, allocating surpluses and reserves to those who need them, and addressing food price increases to calm market volatility”.
While many countries are facing a food crisis because the conflict in Ukraine has disrupted the supplies from that country and Russia, which together account for an estimated 30 per cent of global wheat exports.
Tirumurti said India “has strongly condemned the killing of civilians in Bucha and supported the call for an independent investigation”.
