34. The Impact of Energy Crisis on the Vegetable Sector in Romania

The Covid-19 pandemic spread throughout the world, followed by the crisis of rising energy and gas prices, and their immediate consequences tend to have disruptive effects on food security, in Romania’s vegetable sector inclusively. The purpose of the chapter is to estimate the effects of energy and fertilizer price changes on producer and consumer prices and the degree of threat to food security in the vegetable sector, including the presentation of several scenarios regarding the change in production costs and vegetable farm net income. Total specific costs, costs of agricultural inputs including energy and fertilizers, farmgate and consumer prices, and related volatility coefficients are among the indicators used for this purpose. The results of the scenarios used reveal that there is a significant impact on producer and consumer prices, but also on the net farm income. At the same time, the results reveal an adaptation of farmers to this crisis by adjusting the use and application of agricultural inputs or cultivated areas. This adaptation of vegetable farmers to crises increases the food insecurity in this sector, which has been confronted with many other vulnerabilities over the years.