50,000 tons of grain to reach Lebanon by end of the week

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: Agencies
27 Jul 2022 20:05
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"Forty-nine thousand tons of wheat will enter the country at the end of this week, and we should not see queues after that," said caretaker economy minister Amin Salam to local sources.

50,000 tons of grain to arrive to Lebanon by end of the week

49,000 tons of wheat are in the process of being expedited to Lebanon and will be received by the end of the week, according to Economy Minister Amin Salam.

The minister said on Wednesday that this supply would assist with eliminating the grain deficit which the country has been suffering for months.

Last May, Lebanese lawmakers on Tuesday voted to use a $150 million World Bank loan to pay for wheat imports. Economy Minister Amin Salam said in April that using a portion of this loan to be spent on wheat would stabilize bread prices for at least six months.

Since the war in Ukraine broke out, the wheat supply in Lebanon has been gradually depleting. So much so that as of now, the remaining wheat reserves would only last for a month and a half, according to minister Salam.

"Forty-nine thousand tons of wheat will enter the country at the end of this week, and we should not see queues after that," Salam told Lebanese reporters.

Lebanese Economic and Social Council General Director Mohammad Seifeddine said in March that 65% of the country's wheat is imported from Russia and Ukraine. He added that in order to meet the demands of the Lebanese, the government must find proper alternative sources, depending on the availability of the necessary amount of funds for the procurement.

Last month, UN Secretary-General António Guterres warned of an unprecedented global hunger crisis, with 276 million facing food insecurity. "There can be no effective solution to the global food crisis without reintegrating Ukraine’s food production, as well as the food and fertilizer produced by Russia, into world markets — despite the war," he said to a ministerial meeting last month.

On Friday, Istanbul hosted the signing of multilateral UN-brokered agreements on lifting restrictions on the logistics of Russian food exports, and on Moscow's assistance in the export of Ukrainian grain, and today it was announced the opening of a control center in Istanbul that would monitor the exportation of Ukrainian grain to resolve the global food crisis.