Korea urgently needs to secure stable supply of crops
Food protectionism is spreading across the world. Following the ban on palm oil exports by the world's largest supplier, Indonesia, the second-largest wheat producer, India, recently suspended the foreign shipment of its crops. The two countries have taken urgent steps to meet their domestic demand first, as the surge in international grain prices is pushing up their domestic prices, leading to the scarcity of these products. The food price burden is also growing in Korea, which heavily depends on imported crops, forcing the country to worry about its stable food security.
Last Saturday, India banned wheat exports, saying, "Our food security is in danger." The South Asian country decided so amid concerns about falling crop production due to heatwave, the continuous surge of global wheat prices, and an alarming rise in domestic food prices. Earlier, Indonesia stopped exporting palm oil as its producers were bent on foreign shipment, pushing domestic prices higher and causing the supply shortage. Other major grain exporters, such as Argentina, Egypt, and Hungary, have also prohibited or restricted their foreign shipments.
These moves are factors that further raise international grain prices, which have already reached record-high levels. Korea is vulnerable to grain price surges and food protectionism. The country's grain self-sufficiency ratio stood at 20.2 percent in 2020. However, the figure plunges to 3.2 percent if rice is excluded. The corresponding rates of wheat and corn were 0.5 percent and 0.7 percent, meaning Korea's supply capacity of these grains is virtually zero. Securing basic staple food is one of the government's basic obligations, but successive administrations have neglected this issue. They trumpeted its importance and vowed to increase food self-sufficiency but made false slogans as policymakers put agriculture on the back burner.
The new government must take effective measures to expand the domestic production of basic foodstuffs. It should raise the target rate for grain self-sufficiency and make budgeting mandatory to attain it. To secure stable import and supply networks, the government also needs to expand the food stockpiling system, now centered on rice, and foster homegrown grain dealers who can compete with international grain majors.
Food protectionism is spreading across the world. Following the ban on palm oil exports by the world's largest supplier, Indonesia, the second-largest wheat producer, India, recently suspended the foreign shipment of its crops. The two countries have taken urgent steps to meet their domestic demand first, as the surge in international grain prices is pushing up their domestic prices, leading to the scarcity of these products. The food price burden is also growing in Korea, which heavily depends on imported crops, forcing the country to worry about its stable food security.
Last Saturday, India banned wheat exports, saying, "Our food security is in danger." The South Asian country decided so amid concerns about falling crop production due to heatwave, the continuous surge of global wheat prices, and an alarming rise in domestic food prices. Earlier, Indonesia stopped exporting palm oil as its producers were bent on foreign shipment, pushing domestic prices higher and causing the supply shortage. Other major grain exporters, such as Argentina, Egypt, and Hungary, have also prohibited or restricted their foreign shipments.
These moves are factors that further raise international grain prices, which have already reached record-high levels. Korea is vulnerable to grain price surges and food protectionism. The country's grain self-sufficiency ratio stood at 20.2 percent in 2020. However, the figure plunges to 3.2 percent if rice is excluded. The corresponding rates of wheat and corn were 0.5 percent and 0.7 percent, meaning Korea's supply capacity of these grains is virtually zero. Securing basic staple food is one of the government's basic obligations, but successive administrations have neglected this issue. They trumpeted its importance and vowed to increase food self-sufficiency but made false slogans as policymakers put agriculture on the back burner.
The new government must take effective measures to expand the domestic production of basic foodstuffs. It should raise the target rate for grain self-sufficiency and make budgeting mandatory to attain it. To secure stable import and supply networks, the government also needs to expand the food stockpiling system, now centered on rice, and foster homegrown grain dealers who can compete with international grain majors.
