MOSCOW, June 14. /TASS/. Russia is actively working on coping with the global food crisis and it is ready to seriously increase the volumes of food supplies to countries in need, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at the 46th session of the Council of Foreign Ministers of the Organization of the Black Sea Economic Cooperation (BSEC), according to a statement released on the ministry’s website.

"I will reiterate Russia’s readiness to seriously increase the volumes of supplies of food and fertilizers under profitable and preferential terms, including for free to most needy countries," he said. "We are taking active actions on coping with the global food crisis in the poorest countries of the South. I want to stress that it is first of all provoked by illegitimate sanctions by the collective West," the minister added.

The Russian Foreign Ministry said earlier that Lavrov voiced Moscow’s initiatives on coping with the crisis in countries of the global South at the meeting of the Council of BSEC Foreign Ministers, including the creation of the gas hub in Turkey and the priority of agriculture production exports to most needy countries within the framework of the Black Sea initiative.