Food

While most of the attention surrounding the war has been toward the suffering of the Ukrainian people the bigger picture shows a bigger problem. Experts say the if the war ended today by the end of this year 400 million people will be facing starvation and if it continues another year the figure will rise to one billion. Russia and Ukraine supply about 25% of the world food supply and a goodly portion of the other products needed for food production such as fertilizer. The first problem was the lack of energy to keep people warm in Europe but that will seem like a minor inconvenience when people in Africa begin to starve. This will put more pressure on diplomats to reach a peaceful conclusion to the war, assuming they care.