NOVOPOKROVKA, Ukraine — On a ferociously hot summer morning, a pair of tractors rumbled through a field of green, spraying squat sunflower stalks ahead of a harvest that has taken on greater significance than ever beyond this farm outside the central Ukrainian city of Dnipro.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine upended the workings of what before the war was the world's fourth-largest grain exporter. Almost six months into Moscow's blockade of the Black Sea, the primary outlet for Ukraine's wheat and oilseed exports, more than 22 million tons of grain and other crops remain stranded inside the country, with nowhere to go and fewer and fewer places for storage.
An internationally brokered deal began allowing some cargo ships to set sail from Ukraine last week. But their freight represents a tiny fraction of the total awaiting liberation. Worse yet, the logjam is set to grow, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said, with the 2022 wheat harvest already being reaped while last year's sits trapped.
