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Ukraine accounts for 47 percent of the world’s exports of sunflower oil, a common cooking oil in developing nations and a staple ingredient in processed foods from bread to mayonnaise because of its mild flavor.
Russia’s invasion has halted those exports, pushing consumers to grab alternatives and sending all kinds of cooking oils to record prices after crop failures in Canada and South America have curtailed supplies even more.
Russia is the second largest exporter of sunflower oil and seeds but has now banned exports of sunflower and rapeseed oils to protect domestic supplies.
The result: sunflower oil’s price is up 44 percent on 31 March year over year, rapeseed oil 72 percent, palm oil 61 percent, soybean oil 41 percent, and olive oil 15 percent.
When sunflower oil began to disappear, food processors quickly switched to rapeseed oil, the easiest substitute, shooting prices up as much as 50 percent within weeks, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Olive oil is not widely used in non-Western countries, which has kept its price gain relatively low. However, bottler Filippo Berrio will raise its olive oil price by as much as 20 percent as supplies begin to run out next month, the company said in a statement.
Olive crushers “are demanding the new market price to deliver” their contracted amounts, Walter Zanre, the company’s U.K. chief, told the WSJ.
The sunflower is Ukraine’s national flower.
TREND FORECAST: Russia’s attack on Ukraine and resulting sanctions from the West could lead to malnutrition in the Mideast, famine in Africa, or food riots in Egypt.
This is a dramatic demonstration that the world is inextricably interconnected. Our Top 2022 Trend toward Self-Sufficient Economies will help ease problems created by that interconnection but will not turn every country into a silo.