"Totally disruptive": Consumers to feel effect of Ukraine invasion at supermarket check-out

The Black Sea region accounts for more than one-third of global wheat exports and a sustained conflict in Ukraine and sanctions on Russia could see the price of wheat rise by up to 61 per cent, according to analysis by Rabobank.

Wagga farmer Alan Brown said growers across the district were watching the conflict closely as all-out war in the region could be "totally disruptive" to global wheat prices.

"We're certainly keeping an eye on it," he said.

"If they [Russia and Ukraine] are out of the market, that's still a lot of people [who've] got to eat grain."

Mr Brown said Australian producers would be well-placed to fill the increased global demand for grain after a productive summer harvest.

"Quite a lot of it hasn't actually got a home yet," he said.

"So I'd say we're well-set to supply particularly feed grain from eastern Australia because there was so much of it."

Mr Brown said it was hard to see increased grain prices having a "dramatic effect" on food prices.

"It's possible, but there's five cents worth of wheat in every loaf of bread," he said.

"It's not exactly a big impost."

But Andrew Negline, who has worked in the red meat and livestock sector for 25 years - including spending time in Russia - said a sustained increased in grain prices would likely to contribute to already-high prices at the butcher and supermarket check-out.

"The forecast is already showing that meat prices, both lamb and beef, are going to be strong for the next 12 months," he said.

"This is going to be a kicker that's going to increase prices even further."

The former Wagga deputy mayor said Russia, Ukraine and America had all been stockpiling wheat, suggesting supply will be short for some time.

"Basically they see this war as something that's not going to happen overnight, and that is going to be sustaining a long-term upward trend in pricing," he said.

Mr Negline said the imposition of harsh international sanctions on Russian exports would have a "devastating" effect on the country's poor rural population.

"The sanctions do have an incredibly negative effect in the regional towns outside of Moscow and St. Petersburg," he said. "They (will) feel it pretty hard."

A report released by Rabobank suggests the world's reliance on Black Sea wheat exports is even greater than when the Ottoman Empire blockaded Russian wheat supplies during World War I.

The price of wheat rose 45 per cent in just four months between October 1914 and February 1915.

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