By 2025, Russia may become the world leader in the food market - Alexey Martynov

Against the background of the decline in the global agro-industrial complex after the pandemic, Russian farmers have every chance to take a leading position in the global food market from 2025, political scientist Alexei Martynov believes.

"The consequences of the collapse after the pandemic for the systems of international cooperation and the global economy have yet to be calculated and assessed. Today, we can state a serious decline in the sector of the global agro-industrial complex (AIC), where our country is demonstrating good growth dynamics. It can be expected that in the near future until 2025 Russian farmers can take a leading position in the global food market," he said.

According to the expert, the sanctions that were imposed in Europe against Russia led directly to the opposite effect, including due to retaliatory measures to limit food imports. The expansion of state support for the agro-industrial complex in recent years and the general course of the government to develop the industry are bearing fruit - agriculture has become one of the flagships of the economy.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, the number of people facing food insecurity due to the pandemic has increased by 132 million. The political scientist believes that in the future, with population growth and climate change, the value of this segment of the economy will increase.

In his opinion, our country has a huge potential for increasing agricultural production. In addition, the growth of the industry is intensified by the active introduction of modern agricultural technologies and digitalization, the achievements of selection and genetics. All this largely offsets the sectoral risks faced by other countries.
Despite difficult weather conditions, the current year has become successful for farmers. For the third year in a row, the country has received more than 120 million tons of grain, set records for the collection of oilseeds, fruits and berries, and increased the production of sugar beets, buckwheat and other socially significant products.

As Minister of Agriculture Dmitry Patrushev said at a meeting with deputies of the United Russia faction on December 8, in general this year the department expects that the grain harvest will exceed 123 million tons in net weight. In addition, farmers will harvest about 23 million tons of oilseeds and about 40 million tons of sugar beets.

Despite the fact that this year the bad weather weakened the results in the collection of potatoes and vegetables, and here we managed to reach worthy indicators. 6.7 million tons of potatoes have already been harvested, which is 100 thousand tons more than a year earlier. Open ground vegetables were obtained at a comparable level to last year, while due to a significant increase in greenhouses, the total figure will be higher - about 7 million tons.

The situation is similar in animal husbandry. Outbreaks of avian influenza and ASF have led to a reduction in the number of poultry and pigs, but it is clear that meat production will not be lower than last year. The positive dynamics for milk will also continue - a record for the last 11 years will be reached here.
“If you look at the global picture – widespread production cuts, the closure of large agricultural enterprises due to the pandemic, disruption of supply chains and food shortages, then in this “non-ideal storm” our country is in a favorable position. Russians cannot face the problem of empty shelves or reduction range of products. On the contrary, competition and offers of high-quality products are increasing," Martynov said.

He stressed that social support for citizens, as well as government regulatory measures, can significantly smooth out jumps in world prices for basic products. In particular, the mechanisms of customs and tariff regulation quite effectively protect our market from excessive export volumes and the influence of the global price environment.

Alla Vysotskaya, Director General of the Agricultural and Industrial Complex Vozrozhdenie Union, noted that against the backdrop of the ongoing pandemic, food security has become more relevant than ever, and one of the important mechanisms for strengthening it is the renewal of agricultural machinery.

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"In such conditions, Russia will certainly be able to dominate the global food market by 2025, but only if we are already active and begin to comprehensively develop the agricultural industry in such areas as the renewal of the park According to Rosstat, there are three tractors and two grain harvesters per 1,000 hectares of land in our country, while in India there are 12 tractors on the same area, and in the United States - 27," Vysotskaya said. .