Nelson de Sá: Without fertilizers, ‘a global food crisis’ is coming

On Bloomberg, Brazilian farmers “missed the bet” and could run out of fertilizers to plant, among others, soybeans. They usually buy much earlier, but prices have risen in 2020, in part “due to sanctions against Belarus, leading to a delay in buying”.

Russia and Belarus are among “the world’s largest fertilizer suppliers”. Now, with war and more sanctions, only 28% of Brazil’s needs, “the world’s largest importer”, are met.

The same Bloomberg reported that Lula credited the crisis to the “total irresponsibility” of closing, in the Michel Temer government, the seven factories of inputs for fertilizers owned by Petrobras. “Brazil could be self-sufficient,” he told Som Maior radio.

In a report at the top of the front page, signed by the correspondent in Brazil with reports from the US, China and Afghanistan, the New York Times warned of “a global food crisis”, with “a worldwide increase in hunger”.

“Farmers from Brazil to Texas are cutting fertilizers, threatening the size of the next crops”, publishes the newspaper, with the photo above and others. “Food and fertilizer prices are rising rapidly”, in a context of “a catastrophe without precedent since the Second World War”, says the UN director for the fight against hunger.

“Rising prices and famine present a new dimension to the view of war”, evaluates the NYT. “Could it amplify anger against Russia? Or would frustration be directed at Western sanctions that help lock up food and fertilizer?”

The paper hears from an Afghan importer that “the United States thinks it only sanctioned Russia and its banks, but the United States sanctioned the whole world.”

MORAL

Germans such as FAZ, with photo in the headline (above), and Süddeutsche Zeitung covered the economy minister’s trip to the United Arab Emirates, seeking an option to Russia, noting that it was “morally questionable”. Charged, the green politician defended the country, which is waging war in Yemen.

REVOLT

In El Periódico de España, including Instagram (above), “A genocidal trophy for Bolsonaro: artists declare war on the president”. A revolt that goes “from visual art to theater, from sculpture to cinema, passing through literature, music”.