Can Vietnam survive food shortages with locally grown produce?

[ASEAN NOW News]

After more than three months of war in Ukraine, economists and aid agencies say the world is facing merging crises that could lead to a global food emergency.

 

Food and fertilizer prices were already climbing to record levels before the conflict due to shipping constraints, high energy costs, and natural disasters.

 

Sanctions, import bans, destruction of infrastructure, a refugee crisis, and supply chain disruptions due to the conflict in Ukraine are stoking global food prices and risking shortages.

 

Importantly, higher prices and potentially falling inventories could mean greater food insecurity in the US and around the world.

 

Here in Vietnam, we reported just this week that a liter of the most affordable vegetable oil now costs VND48,000-55,000 ($2.07-2.38), 50 percent higher than at the beginning of this year and double the price two years ago.

 

Producers blame the rising prices on higher input costs.

 

Price of palm oil, a leading edible oil, has quadrupled in the last two years.

 

Indonesia, the world's biggest palm oil producer, has halted exports to contain soaring prices of the product.

 

The day after it did so on April 28, prices jumped by 2.74 percent to RM7,401 (US$1,612.6) per ton, according to the Malaysian Palm Oil Council.

 

Other production costs, including transportation and packaging, have also been rising sharply in recent months.

 

"Prices are likely to rise further in the second half of this year if the world market remains volatile, causing shortages in some countries," an executive at a cooking oil company forecast.

 

India, the world’s top buyer of palm, soybean, and sunflower oil, is suffering from rising prices following supply disruptions caused by the conflict in Ukraine, adverse weather in South America and a labor shortage in Malaysia.

 

75% from Ukraine and Russia

 

 

Ukraine and Russia used to account more than 75 percent of global exports of sunflower oil, one of the world’s four leading edible oils, while Brazil and Argentina are among the largest soybean oil suppliers to India.

 

The same shortage has happened in Europe, with British supermarkets rationing cooking oil and prices quadrupling in Spain following panic buying.

 

Business website Trading Economics expects palm oil prices to scale a new high of $1,665 in the next 12 months.

 

Sharp rises for Rice too

 

Rice is another commodity that the world especially the poor rely on too.

 

Bangkok Post reported this week that rice exporters have expressed growing concerns about shipment prospects in the second quarter, as a sharp rise in domestic prices may lead importers to balk at buying Thai grains.

 

 

Rice production in Vietnam in the Mekong and Red River deltas is important to the food supply in the country and the national economy.

 

At least Vietnam is one of the world's richest agricultural regions and is the second-largest (after Thailand) exporter worldwide and the world's seventh-largest consumer of rice.

 

Hopefully, we will be able to rely on homegrown items, however certain imported products will surge.

 

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