The "Food from Ukraine" Discussion Panel: How Ukraine's Agricultural Potential Is Shaping Global Food Security

Today, Ukraine is more than just a supplier of raw materials. It is a country steadily building its role as a full-fledged participant in global humanitarian food solutions. That was the focus of the Food from Ukraine discussion panel — a conversation about how Ukrainian farmers, processing enterprises, and food technologies can integrate into international aid programs and help build resilient food systems worldwide.

At the center of the discussion was a philosophy of supporting Ukraine by involving its agricultural sector in global humanitarian initiatives — ranging from supplying finished products to localizing production in countries most in need of food stability.

Particular attention was given to plans for launching food production facilities in Ghana, Kenya, and Namibia using Ukrainian raw materials and technologies — spanning bread and pasta production to oil, meat, and fish processing.

Panel Participants

The panel was moderated by Mike Penrose, Chair of RIDNE's International Advisory Committee and former CEO of UNICEF UK and Save the Children. Penrose has long worked with RIDNE, a Ukrainian consortium of small and medium-sized food producers that brought producers together to supply Ukraine's humanitarian food market — and later applied the same model in Ghana, launching a regional food distribution hub in Accra.

Speakers included representatives of the public sector and leading global humanitarian organizations:

• Denys Bashlyk — Deputy Minister of Economy, Environment and Agriculture of Ukraine, who presented the government's vision for developing the country's agricultural potential.
• Stephanie Rivalle — former French Ambassador to Uganda and former head of Action Against Hunger, an expert in humanitarian food programs in Africa.
• Nimko Ali — human rights advocate and founder of The Five Foundation, working with vulnerable communities in crisis regions.
• Lord Jonathan Oates — member of the UK House of Lords and Executive Director of a global anti-hunger coalition.

Michael Capponi, CEO of Global Empowerment Mission, joined the discussion online.

The Core Idea

The panel's key message was both simple and strategic: the food security of the future is shaped not only by production volumes, but by partnerships, the development of processing capacity, and the inclusion of agricultural countries in full product creation chains.

Today, Ukraine can already be more than the breadbasket of the world — it can be an active architect of resilient food systems.