The West has three options when it comes to famine caused by the war in Ukraine

Editorial: Option one is to do nothing, and the deafening silence on action to end the global food crisis from the G7 suggests this is the favoured approach

Ukrainian farmers mix grain of barley and wheat after the harvesting of crops in Odesa last week (EPA)

Often as not, it is what doesn’t come out of an international summit that is the important thing – and right now that is heartbreakingly true of the G7 leaders. They are, quite simply, ignoring the incipient widespread famine that is emerging as a tragic consequence of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Because of the disruptions of the war and the mining and blockade of the port of Odesa by the Russian Navy, millions of tonnes of grain and sunflower oil that should now be feeding people in Africa, the Middle East and south Asia is sitting in warehouses waiting to be exported or to rot or to be stolen and transported to Russia. When there are bread queues in Ukraine, there should be cause for concern.

The West has three options, all of them unpalatable and risky.