WFP chief calls for Black Sea ports to be opened to avert food security crisis

The World Food Programme (WFP) has urged for a “political solution” as the closure of Ukrainian ports in the Black Sea continues to threaten food supplies and millions of lives around the world.

Without it, the threat to global food security posed by the ongoing war in Ukraine will result in “famine, [the] destabilisation of nations as well as mass migration by necessity” according to David Beasley, the WFP’s executive director.

In a debate at the United Nations Security Council on May 19, he stated: “Truly, failure to open those ports in Odesa region will be a declaration of war on global food security. And it will result in famine and destabilisation and mass migration around the world.”