With an investment of 315 million, Norway has a large amount of grain, is the food crisis really coming?
According to Red Star News, recently, the Norwegian government announced that it had signed grain purchase agreements with four private companies, intending to store at least 15,000 tons of grain in 2024 and at least 30,000 tons by 2025.
In addition to this, Norway's Minister of Agriculture and Food, Gelpolestad, said that Norway aims to store at least 82,500 tons of grain by 2029.
As we all know, Norway implemented a grain storage program in the 50s of the last century, but the program was completely stopped in 2003.
Now, after 20 years, Norway has relaunched its grain stockpiling program.
So many people are curious, why does Norway make such a big stockpile?
First of all, behind Norway's grain stockpiles is a concern about future instability.
Earlier, the Minister of Agriculture and Food of Norway, Gelpolestad, said in an interview that the creation of emergency food reserves is to deal with the unthinkable, and in the event of a major disruption in the international trading system or the failure of national food production, there should be additional security measures, which is an important part of strengthening the country's emergency preparedness.
There are a few signs worth paying attention to in this interview:
First: Dealing with the unthinkable, what is the unthinkable? To put it bluntly, it's war.
I have to say that the world is chaotic enough now, under the stirring of the United States, the Russian-Ukrainian conflict has continued until now, and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is also developing towards an uncontrollable situation, and the United States intends to invest $345 million in military aid to frogs two days ago.
Now the whole world is like a bundle of dry wood, and the United States is constantly lighting fires everywhere, and the United States intends to sacrifice the peace of the whole world to expand its own pockets.
Seeing that the instability has increased, Norway has stockpiled food in advance, in other words, this move is undoubtedly a precautionary measure.
Second: under what circumstances will this occur when there is a major disruption in the international trading system? It is nothing more than the intensification of geopolitical conflicts.
According to the statistics of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, the food price index in March 2022 rose by 12.6% year-on-year, jumping sharply to the highest level since the index was established in 1990, in other words, the Russia-Ukraine conflict has pushed up international food prices.
Another example is the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the Red Sea crisis caused by the Houthis' attack on Israeli ships in the Red Sea in support of the Palestinians, which led to a global capacity crunch and soaring shipping prices, which are all factors that have affected the international trading system significantly.
Thirdly: the failure of the country's food production, which is referred to as extreme weather.
As we all know, Norway mainly relies on food imports because of its relatively low grain production, in other words, the level of other people's food production determines its rice bowl.
For example, in recent years, extreme weather has swept the world, and since the summer of 2024, extreme weather has almost covered the northern hemisphere, and many countries from Europe to Asia have encountered climate challenges such as high temperatures, droughts, and floods.
Studies have shown that every 1°C increase in global average temperature will lead to a 19.7% reduction in the output of major food crops, including wheat by 6%, rice by 3.2%, corn by 7.4%, and soybean by 3.1%.
According to statistics, by 2040, hot weather will reduce global food production by 30% to 40%.
In other words, extreme weather is the main culprit of the global food crisis, and Norway chose to stock up on food in advance in order to cope with the global food crisis.
Moreover, this time, the Norwegian government has invested heavily in grain stockpiling.
According to its official data, the Norwegian parliament previously approved an annual allocation of 63 million Norwegian kroner for the grain stockpiling plan, and if the amount of 82,500 tons of grain stockpiled by 2029 is calculated, then the cumulative cost will be as high as 315 million Norwegian kroner.
Of course, in addition to stockpiling grain, Norway has also made other preparations.
According to the data, Norway has established a global seed bank in Svalbard in the Arctic Circle as a "backup" of the world's biological genes, and it is understood that so far, the seed bank has stored nearly 1 million seed samples.
Norway's move to stockpile a large amount of grain while stockpiling seeds may prove that the food crisis is not far away.