India has called on the international community to work collectively to safeguard critical sea lanes, stressing that secure and predictable maritime trade routes are essential for the uninterrupted movement of food, fertilisers and fuel, as conflicts continue to disrupt global supply chains and deepen food insecurity.
Addressing the UN Security Council's high-level open debate on 'Food Under Fire: The Security Council's Role in Mitigating Global and Local Food Crises', India's Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Ambassador Harish Parvathaneni, said armed conflicts were increasingly generating consequences well beyond the immediate theatres of war.
"Food insecurity remains one of the gravest humanitarian consequences of armed conflict. Today's conflicts increasingly generate ripple effects far beyond the immediate theatre of hostilities," Parvathaneni said.
He noted that disruptions to energy markets, fertiliser supplies, maritime transport, humanitarian logistics and agricultural trade had demonstrated how regional conflicts could undermine food security worldwide, with the greatest burden falling on developing countries that are heavily dependent on imports.
India said the UN Security Council's immediate priority should be to mitigate the humanitarian consequences of conflicts.
"This requires facilitating safe, rapid and unimpeded humanitarian access, supporting de-confliction arrangements where appropriate, and ensuring that the Council's own measures, including sanctions regimes, do not inadvertently impede humanitarian assistance or legitimate food and agricultural trade."
Emphasising the need to preserve the safety and freedom of navigation for commercial shipping in accordance with international law, Parvathaneni said, "Secure and predictable maritime trade routes are indispensable for the uninterrupted movement of food, fertilisers, fuel and other essential commodities."
"Disruptions to commercial shipping during conflicts can have cascading effects far beyond the immediate region, disproportionately affecting food-importing developing countries and humanitarian operations," he said.
"The international community must therefore work collectively to safeguard critical sea lanes and maritime infrastructure, while ensuring that legitimate commercial trade and humanitarian shipments are able to proceed without undue impediment," he added.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the Council that 2025 had witnessed the highest number of armed conflicts since the Second World War, while also recording one of the highest levels of global acute hunger, with at least 266 million people facing acute food insecurity.
He described the confirmation of simultaneous famines in Sudan and Gaza during 2025 as a "shameful milestone", and noted that conflict and violence were the primary drivers in 12 of the 13 global hunger hotspots identified in the UN's latest Hunger Hotspots report.
Referring to the ongoing US-Israel conflict with Iran, Guterres said the Strait of Hormuz carried about one-fifth of global oil supplies and one-third of global fertiliser trade.
"Restrictions and closures have driven up commodity prices, and made availability plummet. And attacks on commercial vessels in the Red Sea are further threatening supply chains for food and other commodities," he said.
India maintained that food insecurity was fundamentally a consequence of conflict, political instability and underdevelopment, rather than their root cause.
Parvathaneni called for timely and objective assessments of disruptions to critical supply chains, including food, fertiliser, fuel and humanitarian logistics, with support from specialised agencies such as the Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Food Programme.
"Such assessments must remain objective, evidence-based and free from politicisation," he said.
India also urged member states, international financial institutions, regional organisations and development partners to strengthen domestic agricultural production, diversify supply chains, improve storage and logistics infrastructure, and promote climate-resilient agriculture.
"Predictable and affordable access to fertilisers, quality seeds, technology and concessional finance remains indispensable, particularly for developing countries. Open, transparent and rules-based trade in food and agricultural inputs also remains critical to global food security," Parvathaneni said.
He cautioned against "over-reliance" on any single production model, saying such dependence could leave countries vulnerable to geopolitical disruptions, economic coercion and the weaponisation of supply chains.
"We must encourage small and marginal farmers to enhance their productivity and contribute to ensuring food security in developing countries of the Global South. We must also encourage climate-resilient crops such as millets rather than limit conceptions of food security to the biggest staple, grain crops such as rice, wheat and corn," he said.
(With inputs from PTI)
