My next piece is on this topic. It's worse than you think.

Putin's invasion of Ukraine takes a huge amount of grain off the table.

This puts hundreds of millions in North Africa and the Middle East in jeopardy of starvation. Before the invasion, 50 million were already slowly starving and 30% of the population was hungry.

Biden called India, who has not joined in the sanctions on Russia.

He pleaded with them to join sanctions and to release wheat from their stockpile. Because India has a huge reserve of wheat right now.

They cannot sell wheat on the world market because they heavily subsidize production. The WTO restricts the amount of wheat they can sell internationally.

So, they have big reserves.

That's how it was hoped the hungry masses of the Middle East and Africa might be fed this Summer and Fall. That's how they were hoping to keep the Ukraine Crisis from spreading.

Biden made a deal with Modi. India was going to get top dollar for their grain. The WTO was not going to have a problem with it. Millions of people would get to eat and a crisis would be averted.

Then India got a heatwave.

Now, with projections of major crop failures this year in India, Modi has backed out of the deal. He is restricting grain exports.

Good for Indians. Very, very bad for the Middle East and Africa.

This is going to intensify the crisis.