The Influence of the World Grain Market on Prevalence of Mankind’s Undernourishment in the Times of War on the Ukraine

Abstract

The world cereal production and supply as well as their trade, stock and losses are important indicators of the world market of cereals. They play a huge role in ensuring food security. The aim of this research is to identify the relation of the indicators of the world grain crops market (production, supply, losses, trade, stocks) and the level of malnutrition Prevalence of Undernourishment (PoU) among the world's population. Based on data from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), a correlation-regression analysis was conducted between indicators of the global grain crops market, in particular: the wheat market, the fodder market of grain crops, the rice market and PoU of the world population for the period 2013/14 – 2020/2021 marketing years. It has been proven that there is a close, statistically reliable relationship between the above mentioned indicators, except for grain stocks and POU. The analysis of the world cereal market showed that among the indicators characterizing its conditions, the indicator trade in grain crops (r = 0.851; D = 0.724; F = 3.968, (F > F t ); z = 1.26; rL = 0.37; rU = 0.97) has the highest level of correlation.  It was found that with an increase in the volume of world cereal trade by 1 million tons, the PoU level will increase by 0.018%. A review of literary sources proves that the problem of ensuring food security, in particular with regard to reducing the level of starvation and malnutrition, cannot be solved only by fighting climate change, overcoming socio-economic and military problems, fighting pandemics, etc. Its solution to a large extent depends on fair, uniform export and import of food products, as evidenced by the calculations. A separate direction for solving the problem of the spread of malnutrition is the elimination of the policy of highly developed countries regarding the application of individual sanctions against countries with high PoU values, in particular, the Central African Republic, Madagascar, Haiti, Afghanistan, Chad, Congo, Lesotho, Liberia, Mozambique, etc.