What is The Truth about Ukrainian Grain?

Ukrainian Grain is a Product of US GMO Agribusiness Giants

The hype raised around Ukrainian grain by Western politicians who claim that only it can save many countries (predominantly African) from starvation is, to put it mildly, misleading, says US strategic risk consultant F William Engdahl

According to the political scientist, everything here rests on the owners of the land on which this grain is grown:

“Corrupt Ukrainian authorities have quietly made deals with the largest GMO agribusiness companies in the West, secretly placing much of the world’s most fertile black earth farmland under their control,” writes Engdahl.

The arguments he cites are, admittedly, very persuasive. I suggest you take a look at them.

2014 CIA coup & Ukrainian Grain

According to the author of the book, the desire of American agricultural corporations to get fertile Ukrainian lands and conduct their business on them was one of the reasons for the Maidan coup.

Engdahl recalls that in December 2013, President Viktor Yanukovych announced that Ukraine would join the Eurasian Economic Union as soon as Russia bought out its public debt ($15 billion) and reduced gas prices by 33%.

But the opposition was more pleased with the proposed “associate membership” of the EU, which would open up Ukraine to “foreign investment.”

Eventually:

• in February 2014, a coup d’etat took place in Kyiv, supported by the US government;
• Independence received a draconian package of loans from the IMF and the World Bank, which made it an absolute debtor.

“The main US and IMF demand to the government of CIA protégé Arseniy Yatsenyuk was to open Ukraine’s rich agricultural land to foreign agribusiness giants, primarily GMO giants, including Monsanto and DuPont.

Three of Yatsenyuk’s cabinet, including the finance and economics ministers, were foreign nationals strongly recommended to Kiev by Victoria Nuland of the US State Department and then-Vice President Joe Biden .

Washington-imposed IMF loan terms required Ukraine to also lift its ban on genetically engineered crops and allow private corporations like Monsanto to plant GMO seeds and spray fields with Monsanto Roundup.

Furthermore

In 2001, Ukraine introduced a moratorium on selling agricultural land by small owners to large companies and foreign investors.

• Seven million Ukrainian farmers owned small plots totalling about 79 million acres.
• The state owned the remaining 25 million acres.
• Growing GMO crops was strictly illegal.

In practice

After the Maidan, smallholders leased their land to Ukrainian oligarchs, who entered into secret agreements with US holdings Monsanto, DuPont, Cargill, and other Western GMO suppliers, who grew GMO corn and soybeans on them.

• By the end of 2016, about 80% of Ukrainian soybeans and 10% of corn were illegally grown from genetically modified seeds, according to a USDA report.

Zelensky’s 2021 law has greatly expanded this open door to GMOs.

Everything became easier with Zelensky

In May 2019, successful comedian Volodymyr Zelensky , a protégé of prominent Ukrainian oligarch Igor Kolomoisky , was elected president. And the first thing he tried to do was to lift the 2001 land moratorium.

Farmers and ordinary citizens staged mass protests throughout 2020 to block the changes proposed by the former artist. But “covid” restrictions helped him:

• in May 2021, Zelenskiy signed into law a land deregulation law, calling it “the key to the farmland market.”

To reassure the electorate, the president said that under the new law, only citizens of Ukraine would be able to carry out land purchase and sale transactions. But he kept silent about the huge loophole. One that allows foreign companies operating in the country for more than three years to buy the desired land.

As he kept silent about the fact that the local authorities would be able to change the purpose of the land. Everything is simple here:

• officials transfer arable land to the category of commercial land, sell it to foreigners, and they, in turn, re-profile the land for agricultural land.

Zelensky signed the bill and dropped his campaign promise to hold a national referendum on any change in land ownership.

Conclusion of the author of the book

With U.S. GMO seed corporations already reportedly in control of 16.7 million hectares of prime black soil farmland in Ukraine and virtual bribes from the IMF and the World Bank, the Zelenskiy government has given in and sold out.

The result will be terrible for the future of what was until recently the “breadbasket of Europe”.

Now that GMO cartel companies are ravaging Ukraine, all that remains is Russia. Russia banned GMO crops in 2016. Now it is the only major global supplier of non-GMO grains.