«Експорт електроенергії з України до європейських країн може замінити значні обсяги імпорту газу з Росії»
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Liz Truss, who is widely expected to become Britain’s new prime minister this week, has pledged to act within a week to tackle a cost-of-living crisis fueled by soaring energy bills linked to the war in Ukraine.

But Truss, speaking to the BBC Sunday, refused to provide any details on the actions she would take, suggesting it would be wrong to discuss specific policies until she takes the top post. She stressed, however, that she understands the magnitude of the problems facing Britain.

The government has been unable to address soaring inflation, labor strife and strains on the nation’s creaking health care system since early July, when Johnson announced his intention to resign and triggered a contest to choose his successor. The ruling Conservative Party will announce the winner Monday.

“I want to reassure people that I am absolutely determined to sort out this issue as well as, within a month, present a full plan for how we are going to reduce taxes, how we’re going to get the British economy going, and how we are going to find our way out of these difficult times,’’ said Truss, who has been foreign secretary for the past year.

Truss is facing Rishi Sunak, the government’s former Treasury chief, in the contest to become Conservative Party leader and so prime minister. Only dues-paying party members were allowed to vote in the election, putting the choice of Britain’s next leader in the hands of about 180,000 party activists.

During the campaign, Truss promised to increase defense spending, cut taxes and boost energy supplies, but she refused to provide specifics on how she would respond to the cost-of-living crisis.

With household energy bills set to increase by 80% next month, charities warn that as many as one in three households will face fuel poverty this winter, leaving millions fearful of how they will pay to heat their homes.

The Bank of England has forecast that inflation will reach a 42-year high of 13.3% in October, threatening to push Britain into a prolonged recession. Goldman Sachs has estimated that inflation could soar to 22% by next year unless something is done to mitigate high energy prices.
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Із порту «Південний» вирушили 6 суден, «Чорноморськ» – 5, а з порту «Одеси», – 2
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The finance ministers of the Group of Seven leading industrial nations agreed Friday to move forward with an unprecedented plan to cap the price of oil that Russia sells on global markets in order to limit the funds that Moscow uses to pay for the war in Ukraine.

The price cap proposal comes as the European Union prepares to implement a complete embargo on Russian oil in December. The EU plan would also ban companies in the bloc from insuring or financing Russian oil shipments.

U.S. officials have expressed concern that a complete ban on Russian oil sales to the EU, along with the further disruption caused by the insurance and financing restrictions, could tip the global economy into recession.

The price cap, being pushed by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, would create an exception to the ban for oil that is sold at or below the cap.

Energy market experts pointed out that the statement released by the G-7 finance ministers Friday was short on details, however, and that the plan would be extremely difficult to enact. Many large oil consumers, including China and India, are unlikely to participate, and even in countries that promise to honor the cap, compliance would be extremely difficult to monitor.

Triggered by Ukraine war

The finance ministers made it clear Friday that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine is the reason they are seeking to choke off Moscow’s supply of oil revenues.

“Russia’s war of aggression is causing global economic disruptions and is threatening the security of the global supply of energy and food,” they said in a statement. “The economic costs of the war and consequent price increases are felt disproportionately by vulnerable groups across all economies and particularly by those countries already facing food insecurities and fiscal challenges.”

They added, “The price cap is specifically designed to reduce Russian revenues and Russia’s ability to fund its war of aggression whilst limiting the impact of Russia’s war on global energy prices, particularly for low- and middle-income countries, by only permitting service providers to continue to do business related to Russian seaborne oil and petroleum products sold at or below the price cap.”

‘Critical step forward’

In a statement released Friday morning, Yellen praised the G-7 for taking a “critical step forward in achieving our dual goals of putting downward pressure on global energy prices while denying Putin revenue to fund his brutal war in Ukraine.”

“Today’s action will help deliver a major blow for Russian finances and will both hinder Russia’s ability to fight its unprovoked war in Ukraine and hasten the deterioration of the Russian economy,” she said. “We have already begun to see the impact of the price cap through Russia’s hurried attempts to negotiate bilateral oil trades at massive discounts.”

Yellen said that she looked forward to working with allies to finalize the proposal in the coming weeks, a tacit admission that the arrangement will require far more than just the assent of the G-7.

To be successful, the 27 EU members would have to unanimously approve the price cap plan. With some members, particularly Hungary, chafing at the restrictions already placed on dealing with Russia, that agreement may be difficult to attain.

Experts dubious

Energy market experts said that there are a number of other practical obstacles to a price cap.

In an email exchange with VOA, Edward C. Chow, a nonresident senior associate with the Center for Strategic and International Studies’ energy security and climate change program, said that many of the key details of the plan were absent and would be difficult to come to agreement on in the time frame being considered.

“There are no specific action steps in the statement,” said Chow, who has worked for 45 years in the international oil and gas business, including 20 years with oil giant Chevron. “It is even missing what price level the cap will be set at or what mechanism will be used for setting the appropriate cap. Indeed, the statement mentioned further consultations with other countries, which have shown little interest [in participating]. This will only slow down the process of formulating a real policy.”

“The problem is that the Western governments have conflicting objectives,” Chow wrote. “They want to greatly reduce Russia’s oil income but without greatly reducing global supply, given the resulting impact on price and their own economies. Oil sanctions were never the silver bullet if the objective is to stop Russia’s all-out assault on Ukraine as soon as possible.”

Monitoring difficulty

“I am skeptical that they can make this work effectively,” James W. Coleman, a professor at Southern Methodist University Dedman School of Law in Dallas, told VOA. “It would take a very high level of monitoring that I don’t think we have any reason to be confident would be successful.”

For example, it would be difficult to track the origin of all the oil purchased by individual countries, especially given the increasingly common ship-to-ship oil transfers in international waters.

Coleman pointed out that Venezuela, which is subject to heavy U.S. sanctions, was found in 2020 to be selling its oil to China by diverting it through Malaysia.

“China is now importing more oil from Malaysia than Malaysia produces,” he said.

He said it would also be difficult to ensure countries weren’t compensating Russia for discounted oil by other means, such as price reductions on goods that Russia imports.

“Obviously, nations have all sorts of interactions, and it’s not that hard to pay Russia back in those other interactions that are kind of ‘off the books,’ ” Coleman said.
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Fuel prices increased by about 30% across Indonesia Saturday after the government reduced some of the costly subsidies that have kept inflation in Southeast Asia’s largest economy among the world’s lowest.

Indonesians have been fretting for weeks about a looming increase in the price of subsidized Pertalite RON-90 gasoline sold by Pertamina, the state-owned oil and gas company. Long lines of motorbikes and cars snaked around gas stations as motorists waited for hours to fill up their tanks with cheaper gas before the increase took effect on Saturday.

The hike — the first in eight years — raised the price of gasoline from about 51 cents to 67 cents per liter and diesel fuel from 35 cents to 46 cents.

President Joko Widodo said the decision to increase the fuel prices was his last option as the country’s energy subsidy had tripled this year to 502 trillion rupiah ($34 billion) from its original budget, triggered by rising global prices of oil and gas.

“The government has tried its best as I really want fuel prices to remain affordable,” Widodo told a televised address announcing the fuel hike. “The government has to make decisions in difficult situations.”

He said that the flow of subsidies to the public was not well targeted — about 70% of subsidies were benefiting middle and upper classes — and the government decided instead to increase social assistance.

Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati said authorities were monitoring the impact on inflation and economic growth of the rise in fuel price.

Inflation has been relatively modest with the shock being mostly absorbed through a budget bolstered by energy subsidies. Inflation hit 4.6% in August as Bank Indonesia, the central bank, has said it would reassess the inflation outlook in response to the government fuel price policy.

Indrawati said in a separate news conference that the government would provide 150,000 rupiah ($10) cash handouts to cushion the impact of the fuel price increase on 20.6 million poor families until the year-end. The total cost of the handouts will be 12.4 trillion rupiah, which will be reallocated from the budget for energy subsidies.

She said the government will also spend 9.6 trillion rupiah ($644 million) on salary assistance to about 16 million low paid workers and 2.17 trillion rupiah ($145 million) will go to subsidizing transport costs, particularly for motorcycle taxi drivers and fishermen.

“We hope this can reduce pressure of rising prices and help reduce poverty,” Indrawati said.

The government has subsidized fuel for decades in Indonesia, the vast archipelago nation of more than 270 million people.

Fuel prices are a politically sensitive issue that could trigger other price hikes and risk student protests. In 1998, an increase in prices sparked riots that helped topple longtime dictator Suharto.
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«Росія хоче зруйнувати нормальне життя кожного європейця – в усіх країнах нашого континенту»
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The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization says consumers are not yet feeling the benefits of declining food prices. The FAO says world food commodity prices dipped for the fifth consecutive month in August.

Lower world food prices generally reflect better availability at the global level. However, FAO says, this time, lower wholesale prices have not led to better food access or lower prices for consumers.

FAO Director of the Markets and Trade Division Boubaker Ben-Belhassen said availability has improved, while access to food commodities has not. This, despite declining prices five months in a row.

“This is due to several factors including the persistent high cost of processing and transportation, logistics, and the exchange rate also of currencies of countries as against the U.S. dollar,” he said. “Also, the cost-of-living crisis has affected access. So, that is why we have not seen this decline in prices at the world level translating into lower prices for consumers or at the retail level.”

Ben-Belhassen cautioned that a drop in world prices does not necessarily result in market stability. He said that is subject to the uncertainties and volatility surrounding developments in the energy market and the price of fertilizer.

He said continued high energy and gas prices reduce profitability and increase production costs for farmers. He added that will pose a serious challenge for farmers in the coming year.

He noted the U.N.-brokered Black Sea grain initiative allowing Ukraine to export its grain and other foodstuffs has improved the availability of food on the world market. Prior to the July agreement, Russia had blockaded Ukraine’s three key ports triggering a global food crisis.

Ben-Belhassen said the better availability of food on the global level has not translated into greater access at the consumer level. He said the increased shipment of goods from Ukraine has not alleviated food scarcity in sub-Saharan Africa and other developing countries. He noted that is because most grain exports go to middle-income countries.

“So, it does not really go to those countries that are most affected or are most in need for better domestic supplies,” he said. “We hope the situation will improve with time. We hope that the shipment also will go to these countries.… We are still concerned about access, about the cost-of-living crisis.”

The FAO official says families in low- and middle-income countries tend to spend 50% to 60% of their monthly income on food. He warned the implication for food security could be very serious if consumer food prices do not drop significantly.
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