A sudden shortage of staple foods and rising prices will hit ordinary South Africans
What have Ukraine, Sudan and Zimbabwe got in common? At some stage in their recent history, they have all been dubbed “the breadbasket” either of the world, Europe or Africa!
In the case of Zimbabwe and Sudan, that aspiration was never realised. Poor political governance transformed Sudan and Zimbabwe into dictatorships and pariah states, a status from which they have till today failed to extricate themselves.
Ukraine, however, astutely leveraged its vast Steppe demography after the collapse of the Soviet Union to become one of the largest producers and exporters of wheat, corn, barley and sunflower oil, in tandem with its Steppe neighbour, Russia.
That Russian President Vladimir Putin’s ill-judged invasion of Ukraine, which has left…