Half a year after Moscow announced it was strangling Ukraine's exports through the Black Sea, Kiev opened a new shipping route to break Russia's "golden ring".
In mid-July 2023, President Vladimir Putin announced that Russia would withdraw from the Black Sea grain corridor initiative negotiated by the United Nations and Türkiye. Moscow decided to restore a full blockade of Ukrainian shipping, attacking port infrastructure in the cities of Odessa and Chernomorsk, and warning that any cargo ships bound for Ukraine could be considered military targets.
"At that time, the whole world thought that Russia would completely cut off Ukraine's exports and neutralize the enemy's ports. Everyone understood that there was only one naval power in the Black Sea," Olya Korbut, an expert at the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA), commented on Russia's overwhelming advantage in the strategic sea.
But half a year later, Kiev has turned the tables. Ukrainian grain exports across the Black Sea reached 4.8 million tons in December 2023, compared to the peak of around 4.2 million tons during the grain initiative, according to statistics from Kiev-based agricultural trading company Spike Brokers. Before the fighting broke out in February 2022, Ukraine exported an average of around 6 million tons of grain per month across the Black Sea.
According to Korbut, Ukraine broke the Russian military's "golden ring" with two bold strategies: establishing its own maritime corridor and forcing Russia's Black Sea fleet to retreat deep into the rear.
A cargo ship carrying grain in the Black Sea on July 17, 2023. Photo: Reuters
Of the six countries bordering the Black Sea, Ukraine had the second-longest coastline at 2,782 km before Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, behind only Türkiye. Before the fighting began in February 2022, half of Ukraine’s exports passed through its port system, with agricultural products being a key commodity.
After Russia blockaded Ukraine’s shipping routes on the Black Sea, the European Union (EU) and some neighboring countries sought to relieve Ukraine’s economy by providing grain corridors by road and rail. But this option was not as effective as expected because it was costly, and the rail and road infrastructure could not meet Kiev’s grain export capacity. Pressure from farmers and political groups in Poland, Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary also caused Ukrainian goods to be stuck at border gates.
When Russia withdrew from the Black Sea grain deal and refused to negotiate, establishing its own transport corridor through the sea became the only option for Ukraine.
Ukraine's new maritime transport corridor takes advantage of its and Romania's port infrastructure at the mouth of the Danube, skirting Romanian and Bulgarian territorial waters to deliver goods to Türkiye's Bosphorus Strait and bypassing the Aegean Sea to the Adriatic Sea in Southern Europe.
The initiative indirectly uses the NATO security umbrella to reduce the risk of grain cargo ships being intercepted by the Russian navy, since Romania, Bulgaria and Türkiye are all NATO members. Russian raids on the Danube estuary are limited to Ukrainian ports. Kiev only needs to consider protecting the cargo ships until they enter its neighbor’s territorial waters.
New grain corridor set up by Ukraine from August 2023. Graphics: FT
According to Korbut, Romanian support is the “key to success” for Ukraine’s new grain corridor. Despite a series of raids on the Danube and Odessa estuaries in 2023, Ukraine has worked with Romania to complete several port renovation projects, dredging riverbeds, increasing the number of pilots, and improving the coordination mechanism for waterway traffic.
Romania’s Constanta port will see record grain exports in 2023, with 40% of that coming from Ukraine. The country plans to open a dedicated Ukrainian grain terminal in March. Greece and Croatia are also contributing significantly by allowing Ukrainian grain to transit through their Adriatic ports.
Ukraine's exports via the Danube River ports increased from 14.5 million tons of cargo in February-December 2022 to 29.4 million tons in January-November 2023. In the last five months of last year, after Ukraine announced the establishment of its own transport corridor across the Black Sea, Ukraine's grain exports reached 8.6 million tons, with the peak in December 2023 at 5 million tons.
In 2023, a total of 57 million tons of various goods, including food, were exported by Ukraine by sea, equal to 2022 but only one-third of 2021. Ukrainian Infrastructure Minister Oleksandr Kubrakov is confident that the country can boost food exports via the Black Sea corridor to 48 million tons per year.
In the initial period after withdrawing from the Black Sea Grain Initiative, Russia repeatedly attacked the Ukrainian ports of Mykolaiv, Chornomorsk, and Odessa. Ukrainian port infrastructure and warehouses along the Danube River were also targeted, including Reni, Izmail, Orlivka, and Vylkove.
According to statistics from Kiev, from August to December 2023, about 180 Ukrainian port infrastructure facilities were partially damaged or completely destroyed by Russian attacks, burning about 300,000 tons of grain. Ukraine also accused the Russian military of firing warning shots at the Palau-flagged cargo ship Sukru Okan on August 14, 2023 as it passed through the Danube estuary to the Romanian port of Sulina, then dispatched a Ka-29 helicopter to land military personnel on the ship for inspection.
Faced with the risk of the newly established maritime route being strangled by Russia "in the bud", the Ukrainian army quickly deployed the second spearhead in the plan to liberate sea exports: intensifying attacks on Russian military targets in the Black Sea and Crimea.
Ukraine has used its diverse arsenal to its advantage in the unequal battle over the Black Sea.
They used Neptune missiles, developed on the basis of the Soviet-era 3M24 Uran subsonic anti-ship missile, to prevent Russian warships from approaching the southern coast. Kiev was reinforced with Storm Shadow cruise missiles provided by Europe to attack targets deep in the Crimean peninsula. The Ukrainian military also developed suicide boats and drones to attack Russian ports and warships in the Sevastopol naval base.
During 2022-2023, Russia recorded at least 16 warships hit by Ukrainian attacks, while Kiev reported hitting 24 Russian targets. As a result, the Black Sea Fleet had to gradually withdraw from Crimea, moving its forces further east.
Taking advantage of the Russian navy's setback, the Ukrainian military also regained control of oil and gas rigs off the coast of Crimea in September 2023. In December 2023, the 4,000-ton landing ship Novocherkassk was sunk in Feodosia, southeast of Crimea.
The raids carried out by Ukraine are similar to the strategy of anti-access - area denial, creating a narrow corridor but enough for smooth transportation of goods by sea. For the first time since the war broke out, the Black Sea Fleet was pushed away from the Ukrainian coastal area. The continuous losses forced Russia to loosen the "golden ring" blockade on the Black Sea.
Debris believed to be from the Novocherkassk at a port in Crimea after the attack on December 26, 2023. Photo: Pravda
According to Tymofiy Mylovanov, rector of the Kiev School of Economics, breaking the blockade imposed by Russia on the Black Sea is the only solution for Ukraine to save its agriculture and help the country avoid economic collapse.
After nearly two years of war, Ukraine recorded a budget deficit of up to 43 billion USD in 2023, forcing them to find every solution to stand on their own feet, avoiding complete dependence on financial and economic aid from the West. Opening a new shipping route in the Black Sea has become a "vital choice" for Ukraine.
"The recent developments show that the leadership in Kiev is aware that they cannot rely on foreign aid and loans forever. Ukraine has to earn its own money," said Oleg Suslov, an analyst in Odessa. "The difficulty is that Russia also understands this and will not give up its goal of choking off Ukraine's exports by attacking port infrastructure."
Thanh Danh (According to CEPA, Al Jazeera )
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