Whilst the harvest of soya beans in a La Nina-challenged South America comes to a close, the spring drilling has started in earnest on the other side of the world in Scotland and Ukraine – despite the many difficulties in that latter war-torn country.

Both climate and man are playing major roles in an already tight supply market, leading to high prices and volatility. La Nina has also led to a wet Australia, whilst in Paraguay the soya harvest has been a disaster due to drought.

Different parts of Brazil experienced differing weather, with the Matto Grosso producing good yields with wetter weather, but not without quality and transport problems due to rain. Further south, drought curtailed optimum yields.

In Ukraine, as we all know, the war rages on as the vital spring sowing campaign starts in a gesture of faith and defiance. Whilst new dreadful atrocities and war crimes in East and Central Ukraine become apparent each day. Putin has failed in his initial main objectives, whatever his revisionism over those clearly stated aims.

A clear failure and unprecedented Russian military disaster, as well as a humanitarian atrocity. The bravery and drive of the Ukrainian military and people is humbling in fighting for the values we all hold dear, and can only be applauded and supported by us to the hilt.

I've written before that it would be even more difficult for the Russians to occupy than to invade and they underestimated both. In agricultural terms, the Ukrainian Government realised the vital contribution of Ukrainian farmers both to domestic and international food security and its own economy. Ukrainian farmers have been united in responding to this with vigour and patriotism – heroes with a tractor, rather than a tank.

The spring drilling campaign is well underway and in Western Ukraine potato planting has also started after wheat and is going well. Although 3.5m refugees have left Ukraine, our focus has been – and should continue to be – on the four times that number who have had to flee their homes with little, yet have remained in Ukraine to be close to loved ones.

Half, yes half, the country's children had to flee their homes due to Russian aggression, which will leave deep scars for the young. The UK visa system seems to be in a complete mess, in stark contrast to the outpouring of generosity and welcome by the British public.

All this in Europe in the 21st century. As I've said before, the veneer of civilisation is thinner than most understand. Many have fled west to our Lviv oblast, a place which few had heard of a month ago, but now everyone has.

The official estimates so far are that the Ukrainian harvest will be down by a third. I think this may well be rather optimistic for maize, soya and sunflower, which are all spring sown crops and the biggest areas of these crops are in the east where the most severe fighting is.

All winter drillings remain, but fertilisers, crop protection and fuel will be a problem, particularly in the east. In pockets of the east, the Russians are using a new type of GRAD 'rocket' launcher, Zemledeliye, which fires land mines into agricultural land up to 15km away and make it difficult to farm. Another crime against humanity and the soil.

One is sometimes reminded of previous conflicts whilst farming in Ukraine, by elderly artefacts or ordnance emerging under the plough metal, chainsaw or even on the odd occasion the potato dressing table.

This cynical approach marks a new low, but farming has continued despite mines placed in the east during the Donbas conflict which started in 2014. The soil means more than most to Ukrainians due to the ravages of the Holodomor famine of the 1930s. Another national disaster deliberately caused by Russia as an act of genocide under Putin's hero, Stalin.

As I said in my last column, written only days into the conflict, this will be a global problem, and the ripples and eddies will spread worldwide. Wheat values increased 70% in the last year and maize 50% on tight supply.

Ukraine had become the breadbasket of the Middle East and Indonesia, where food poverty and inflation is already causing unrest and riots in several areas. The cost of living crisis in the UK is the worst for 50 years and was baked in well before the war in Ukraine with Covid and Brexit.

As I write, another Covid wave rages in the UK. A triple whammy of immense proportions, which will knock onto both discretionary and basic spending. Eat or heat for many?

The independent Office of Budgetary Responsibility reports show UK exports have fallen off a cliff. Down 18% from 2019 figures and they have not recovered from Covid-19 and Brexit, unlike the US, Japan and the Euro zone, which have bounced back well. New trade deals only compensate for a tiny fraction of our trade losses.

Other calculations show the effect of Brexit, over the last four years, cost each and every household on average £12,000 in lost GDP, other costs and Brex-flation. This on top of the £1300 cost per household from Covid-19 fraud.

The issue of food security caused the EU to scale back on its Green Deal 'Farm to Fork' programme, aimed at cutting crop protection inputs and fertiliser, as realities of both food and energy policies based on import abundance bite hard.

The European Commission’s strategy sought to reduce pesticides by 50%, devote 25% of agricultural land use to organic farming and reduce fertilisers by 20%. This alone would have raised food prices between 20 and 53%, depending on commodity, on top of everything else pushing in the same upward direction.

Such plans have been heavily criticised in this column and by farming leaders, as they would tighten food supplies and increase dependence on imports. The same is true of English farming plans.

With sanctions on Russia severely disrupting the international food trade in fertilisers, can Europe afford to reduce agricultural output? Banking on organic food, which is notoriously under-productive, expensive and land intensive, is unlikely to guarantee European food security.

Lower yielding, riskier regenerative farming may well add to the problem? Perhaps delays in Scottish farming plans have been unintentionally prescient, as risky English and EU 'green' plans are revised? Consigned to the OBE tray, as my father used to call it – Overtaken By Events.

The UK has been slower to respond but the intensified need for NATO, nuclear power and food security is being recognised – in talk if nothing else? A new energy policy to be announced this week, with several new nuclear plants mooted.

Initially, in one of the biggest farming misjudgements in history, it was stated by a Government official that there was enough UK organic manure to replace fertiliser bag nitrogen. One has to wonder where the minister who came away with that nonsense is receiving his briefing notes from now that ADAS has been privatised?

Too much listening to the 'green' NGOs wearing several pairs of rose-tinted glasses perhaps? It is shocking that there is a drop in potato consumption in the UK in the 21st century due to the high costs of boiling them! Who would have imagined such a situation?

What price Net Zero now? I'm delighted to see that Shell revised its thoughts on the Cambo oil field investment. Laughable to see Patrick Harvie gainsaying this welcome change of heart, in favour of intermittent renewables and pie in the sky energy storage.

Reality always trump's ideology and dogma-eventually. What a difference a month makes. No prizes for those governments unable to keep the lights on or their people fed.

At our recent and well attended SSCR winter combinable crops meeting, we asked the question: 'How do we make the most of our fertilisers.' It is apparent that for that critical and enigmatic element nitrogen, that there has been little progress in N research for decades in practical farming terms, despite claims to the contrary.

I recall standing at farmer meetings 30 years ago and jokingly stating that I could accurately predict exactly how many kg of N a particular wheat crop required, plus or minus 30kgN/ha! Little has changed.

I also recall using leaf nitrate tissue analysis in field with Merckoquant strips and deep soil N cores with Kemira 30 years ago to try and optimise organic manure N value and allowances, which still remain broad brush arts and not clinical science.

This vital element remains a partial enigma and the only thing that has changed is the cost has tripled, thus concentrating minds! My instinct in the current situation is to err on the side of slightly more N than slightly less as prices may well firm further.

We have further clarified the losses and N dynamic pathways, of course, since I started studying N in the late 1970s as a green PhD student. Our ability to predict and apply the correct N rate in the field has not, however, greatly improved, despite many revisions of RB209.

In reality it's still X plus, or minus 30kgN/ha. Any other view is spurious accuracy in my view.

We still have no definitive answer to the question 'Do I apply slightly less or slightly more N to a poorer part of the field?' The correct answer? – 'It depends!'. That's why farmer and agronomist boots on the ground are the best fertiliser.

In-field judgement is still key, as so many complex dynamic variables are in play. To that can now be added cashflow limitations and economics to an even greater extent this season.

Globally, the net results will be less N applied and thus a lower and importantly less resilient global harvest. I have always thought that as well as yield and quality, fertiliser N bought crop resilience. All these effects are due to reduced N fertiliser, not climate change.

Add to this the war in Ukraine and the uncertainty of both its cereal, protein and oil production this season. There are profound doubts over Black Sea exports (80% of Ukraine wheat exports), with damaged ports and waters mined by Russia. All this makes for the most volatile and elevated grain market I can recall in five decades in the industry.

China will come into play again in supply and demand issues, as its zero Covid-19 policy is unravelling in the face of more virulent Omicron variants. China also had its worst wheat drilling for decades due to flooding, so will be an aggressive buyer against much poorer nations, like Indonesia which is now the world's largest wheat importer.

The ripple effects of this rapidly changing situation, leading to volatility and unrest on a wider political scale, are likely to be felt by us all. What is clear is that wherever the seed drill and planters kiss the warm soil this spring, farmers are united in their passionate drive to feed the world.

Never will this be more important than this season. Every extra tonne, wherever it is harvested, will make a difference to food poverty and domestic order around the globe.