Hunger Warfare and a Fertilizer Crisis Are Straining Global Food Supplies

Sep 8, 2026 | Michael Werz
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Using food as a lever is a proven military method as old as siege warfare, now conducted at global range. Both Russia’s and Ukraine’s military missions have now illustrated how twenty-first-century warfare is increasingly boundless, asymmetric, and willing to victimize low-income populations in food import-dependent regions of the world. For hundreds of millions of people across North Africa, the Middle East, and the Horn of Africa, wheat from Russia and Ukraine isn’t just a commodity—it decides whether there is bread on the table.