Black Sea grain exports have been pushed toward what analysts at Oxford Economics describe as a physical supply shock, with Russian and Ukrainian attacks on shipping killing more seafarers in July alone than in the entire preceding period of the war, and disruption now severe enough to threaten global food prices well into 2027.
The Turkish seafarers’ union Türkiye Denizciler Sendikası estimates that 23 people died in July as a result of attacks on 35 ships in the Black Sea. That single month’s death toll exceeded the cumulative maritime fatalities from all previous months of the conflict combined, making the Black Sea the most dangerous body of water for commercial shipping anywhere in the world.
The killing has continued. A merchant vessel heading for a Ukrainian port was struck by a Russian drone on 17 September, killing its captain and injuring three crew members, according to Ukraine’s Infrastructure Ministry, as reported by Safety4Sea. Turkey, alarmed by a pattern of strikes involving Turkish-flagged ships, called on both Moscow and Kyiv in August to impose a moratorium on attacks against civilian vessels.
The Reyhan Sari case and the push for war crimes accountability
One attack illustrates the human cost in particularly stark terms. On 22 July, the Turkish-flagged bulk carrier Reyhan Sari was struck by drones off Novorossiysk while carrying wheat meal from Russia’s Tuapse port to Trabzon. Engine room worker Savas Cakar, 54, was killed; two other crew members were injured. The shipowner, 12 crew members, and Cakar’s family subsequently filed a complaint with the International Criminal Court, seeking an investigation into the attack as a possible war crime, according to Marine Insight.
The International Maritime Organization (IMO) Secretary-General Arsenio Dominguez issued a statement on 13 July condemning attacks on civilian merchant vessels in the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea, calling on all parties to refrain from any action that endangers innocent merchant shipping, to respect international law, and to ensure the protection of seafarers.
Maritime risk intelligence firm Vanguard puts the widening threat plainly: ‘Merchant vessels are now more likely to be affected because of the ports they visit, their trading activity and the cargoes they carry. Attacks have also extended beyond ports and their immediate approaches, increasing the risk to vessels across a wider area of the Black Sea.’
Black Sea grain exports and the scale of what is being lost
The disruption to black sea grain exports is no longer a warning sign. It is a measurable contraction. According to analysis from Oxford Economics cited by Ag Bull Trading, prolonged Black Sea disruption could remove as much as 86 million tonnes of cereals from international trade: 52 million from Russia and 34 million from Ukraine, equivalent to roughly 17% of global cereal exports.
Russia’s wheat exports in August were estimated at 3.0 to 3.4 million metric tonnes, against a five-year average of 5.0 million metric tonnes, the smallest August export volume since the 2016-17 season. Tatiana Orlova, lead emerging markets economist at Oxford Economics, told the Guardian that Russian grain exports were down to approximately 40% of normal export capacity in August, with more than 70% of Russia’s seaborne grain shipments ordinarily leaving from Black Sea ports and a further 20% from the Sea of Azov.
Ukraine’s position is similarly constrained. Kyiv’s monthly seaborne grain throughput has fallen from roughly 7.0 million metric tonnes normally to an estimated 0.5 to 0.6 million metric tonnes, a collapse of around 92%, according to Oxford Economics data. Ukraine’s food minister confirmed recently that the country exported only a third of its exportable grain volume, approximately 1.4 million tonnes, across all routes combined.
This is a sharp regression from the period of the UN-facilitated Black Sea Grain Initiative, which ran from July 2022 until Russia withdrew on 17 July 2023. During those twelve months, over 1,000 ships carried almost 33 million tonnes of grain and foodstuffs out of Ukrainian ports at Chornomorsk, Odesa, and Yuzhny/Pivdennyi.
The consequences fall hardest on import-dependent nations. Russia supplied 26% of Africa’s total wheat imports as of 2021, according to UN Comtrade data compiled by the Leibniz Institute of Agricultural Development in Transition Economies (IAMO), with exports to low-income Sub-Saharan African countries rising in recent years. A sustained reduction in Russian and Ukrainian supply lands disproportionately on precisely those countries with the least capacity to absorb it.
Oxford Economics forecasts global food prices rising by 11.8% in 2026 and a further 4.8% in 2027, with Black Sea disruption compounding weather losses and elevated fertiliser costs. ‘It is pretty clear the food price is going to be affected by this,’ Orlova said. Unlike in 2022, she noted, many importing countries have built up grain stocks, which should provide some buffer. My read is that the buffer buys time but does not change the trajectory: with Russia exporting at decade-low volumes and Ukraine barely moving cargo by sea, the arithmetic points upward.
The question now is whether Turkey’s proposed moratorium gains any traction before the northern hemisphere harvest window closes and the figures for the 2026-27 marketing year are locked in.
