The war between Ukraine has been a worldwide plight that many countries have had to face within the last few years. Many of Ukraine’s European allies have greatly supported them throughout these hardships, even buying most of their agricultural exports to help farmers and businesses survive. However, this has led to the neglect of other European farmers who cannot compete with the low prices at which Ukranian crops are currently selling.

The overwhelming support pouring in for Ukrainian farmers has left no one to buy the crops of other European farmers. Polish, Romanian, and Slovakian farmers are struggling to make ends meet while their silos are full of crops they cannot sell. To correct this issue, the nations have imposed tight restrictions on importing Ukrainian grain so that their domestic harvests will be preferred.

While it was a valiant effort by these countries to support Ukraine during their time of need, it was unwise for them to abandon the needs of their own citizens. These farmers will now struggle to regain control over the market in their own countries as no one will want to pay the large prices it will take for them to make any profit. This will also impact the amount of loyalty and trust that is given to Ukraine by these European countries. While this situation isn’t necessarily their fault, Ukraine has put a bad taste in the mouths of many of its allies.

This is a good learning lesson for farms in America, especially because they rely so heavily on a capitalist business market that promotes competition in order to make a profit. Farms like Way Fruit Farm would not be able to survive if the entire country began to import crops from another struggling country. While the desire to help farmers in Ukraine is admirable, it is not sustainable for business practices in other countries, which Europe is now experiencing.

This raises more questions regarding how much government should interfere with business practices, which has been an ongoing debate for many years. There seems to be an obvious amount of interaction that has to take place between government and businesses, though Europe has clearly not mastered that ratio. It will be interesting to see how these new restrictions will impact the European markets and how countries all over the world will learn from this – maybe by offering less support to Ukraine in extreme circumstances.

Read more about the issue in this New York Times article.