We have a winner for the next thread title right there.
With what's going on in Saudi Arabia and Yemen, I guess we need to be thinking seriously about trade through the Suez Canal at this point because because anything that comes through it goes up past Saudis and Yemenis chucking missiles at each other. Anything that comes through is highly liable to rocket in price - either because of increases to insurance/shipping costs or because it has to go the long way. And anything we export through it is going to get hit hard - I think this is most notably alcoholic drinks for the UK.
So what food comes to Europe via the Suez Canal?
4% of Staple grains and cereals
Processed meats: Thai processed meats and other packaged protein products shipped from Asian markets.
Nuts and seeds
Spices and condiments
Coffee and cocoa
Tea
Tropical and exotic fruits: Bananas, coconuts, coconut milk.
Australian and NZ wine
Palm Oil (lots) from Indonesia
Some of these have already been hit by weather issues or are likely about to be due to El Nino.
The one there that's notable for me is palm Oil because it's in bloody everything processed.
The era of cheap imported food, could really be coming to a close.
I am not even going to mention Tat From China in this conversation.
https://www.cntraveller.in/story/suez-canal-impact-trade-favourite-food/
Thank the Suez Canal for your favourite food
Article from 2021
Every day, approximately 50 ships with a deadweight tonnage of over 220,000 each cross ferrying everything from oil and coal to phones and food. To know its worth, you need only to quickly cast your mind back to the blockage of the canal in March 2021, which cost the world $400 million an hour in losses, amounting to a whopping $9.6 billion over six days. Things were so dire that several warnings were issued over potential food shortages; the global giant Costco faced a shortage of cheese, European coffee producers faced delays on robusta beans from Vietnam, and Indian exporters feared the delay of their grape exports to Europe and North America. But fortunately, six days later, Ever Given was back on track, though not before exposing the dependence of the global food system on this 193km waterway linking the Mediterranean and Red seas.
Article from 2024
https://www.ifpri.org/blog/impacts-red-sea-shipping-disruptions-global-food-security/
Impacts of Red Sea shipping disruptions on global food security
From a food security perspective, which countries are most likely to be affected by the current Red Sea crisis? As outlined in the analysis above, trade disruptions are most likely to impact the countries in East Africa, South Asia, Southeast Asia, and East Asia. Figure 3 shows the share of wheat imports from the EU, Russia, and Ukraine as a percent of total wheat imports in 2021 (the last year for which data on Russian exports was available).
The map shows countries in East Africa, Iran and Pakistan are particularly vulnerable to trade disruptions, due to their relatively high reliance on wheat imports from Europe and the Black Sea. In the case of East Africa, previous research has shown that for many of the countries, imports account for a large share of consumption. Disruptions to imports could put further pressure on food inflation in these countries, which has just begun to abate following consumer price increases in 2022.
As explained above, the analysis assumes that all wheat exports from the EU, Russia, and Ukraine to the regions shown transit through the Red Sea. This may overstate the impact on Russian exports for countries like Iran and China, where alternative albeit more expensive routes may be available (for example, via Caspian Sea ports in Iran or Pacific ports for China).
If the disruptions continue, consumers in importing countries will end up bearing some of the cost increases. Countries may choose to seek alternative suppliers, although El Niño related impacts have reduced wheat production in Australia, another major supplier to the region.
Closure of the Red Sea also would have a detrimental impact on Ukraine maize exports to China (Figure 4). China has accounted for about 20% of Ukraine's maize exports since 2018 and was an important destination under the now-discontinued Black Sea Grain Initiative (BSGI), which allowed passage of shipments from ports in the war-torn region. Long-term disruptions to Red Sea shipping would further harm on Ukraine’s competitiveness, already suffering because of the war and July 2023 termination of the BSGI.
Increased shipping costs would also affect China, as Ukraine had a become a significant supplier of maize to China over the past five years, averaging about 30% of the country’s total maize imports since 2020 (Figure 4). Increased costs of sourcing Ukraine maize would likely push China to increase imports from the United States and Brazil, which has become a major supplier since maize imports from Brazil were approved in late 2022.
The scale of impacts of the Red Sea crisis on shipping, markets, and food security will depend on how long the Houthi attacks continue. While the conflict affects only a small share of overall agricultural trade, a long-term disruption will have clear impacts on some economically vulnerable importing countries in Africa and Asia, forcing them to seek alternative suppliers or pay significantly higher costs to import. If those markets switch suppliers, producers in Europe, Russia, and Ukraine will then likely see lower prices over the longer run. While this worst-case scenario for the Red Sea crisis is still unlikely, the current disruption is a reminder of the fragility of supply chains and the need for countries to be flexible in sourcing food when disruptions occur.
And I'm not considering fertiliser nor oil itself in this - that's every product made with petrol chemicals. And that's a long list too.
Obviously there's limits to what you can do, but I have to confess that a bunch of spices magically fell into my trolley last week quite by accident. I don't know how they got there.
What Zelenskyy said about worldwide food shortages in 2 / 3 months is also relevant here too as he's referring to Ukrainian and Russian grains and the vulnerable areas of the world to Red Sea disruption too.