Global Food Problem: New Challenges for the World and Russia

Abstract

The subject of the study is the state of the food problem in the world and ways to solve it in the context of new challenges and threats. The aims of the work are to analyze the whole complex of causes that destabilize food supply, and to identify counter trends that create prerequisites for reducing the immediacy of this problem in the world. The authors gave an expanded interpretation of the global food problem, which refers not only to a shortage of alimentary products that threatens the food security of states, but also difficulties in the logistics of food delivery and distribution. The study identified conditions that exacerbated the risks of the food problem in the world as a whole and in certain regions in particular, which include the imperfection of the production and resource base, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and climatic factors, geopolitical cataclysms and insufficiently flexible international cooperation. It found that one of the main causes of the rise in food prices in the world is the aggravation of the global geopolitical situation, which entailed the transformation of the basic economic ties of states and global supply chains, and this became a serious challenge not only for Russia, but for all states of the world. Based on the analysis of current trends in providing people with alimentary products, the study concludes that the symptoms of a serious agri-food crisis are growing in the context of slowing economic growth in the world, increasing unemployment and declining real incomes of the population affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, and because of the aggravation of the politico-military situation in the world, climate change and economic shocks.