World faces food ‘catastrophe’ if Strait of Hormuz disruption persists: FAO

Global agriculture is highly exposed to the waterway blockage, risking higher commodity prices and food inflation.A prolonged disruption in the Strait of Hormuz could result in a global food “catastrophe”, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has warned, as shipments of critical agricultural inputs remain blocked in the key waterway due to the US-Israel war on Iran.Food prices have not risen yet because existing stocks are absorbing the shock, the United Nations body’s chief economist, Maximo Torero, said in an interview on Monday, alongside David Laborde, director of FAO’s agrifood economics division.Recommended Stories list of 3 itemslist 1 of 3A visual guide to Artemis II and previous missions to the moonlist 2 of 3‘Policy of abuse’: Women march in Cuba against US energy blockadelist 3 of 3Yemen’s teachers pushed to the brink as salaries collapseend of listBut if traffic through the strait does not resume, the shocks to energy and fertiliser markets will translate into higher commodity and retail prices later this year and into 2027, Laborde added.Exports of 20 to 45 percent of key agrifood inputs rely on sea passage through the Strait of Hormuz, according to the FAO.“We are in an input crisis; we don’t want to make it a catastrophe,” said Laborde. “The difference depends on the actions we take.”“Right now, we don’t have a food crisis because we have food availability,” Torero added, noting that the increase in gas and oil prices has not translated yet into higher costs for bread and wheat, for example, thanks to ample supplies coming out of a good harvest season. “But this is now,” the economist said.FertilisersNearly half of the world’s traded urea – the most widely used fertiliser – and large volumes of other fertilisers are exported from Gulf countries via the Strait of Hormuz, making global agriculture highly exposed to any disruption there.