20 June 2026

Hi, this is Mark – I am an economist, and I love working the land. Russian farmers are warning about a crisis. Kremlin economists say Russia is still growing.

Both cannot be right.

In this video, I look at Russia’s economy from the ground up — through agriculture, food inflation, fuel shortages, climate stress, and the war economy. Official GDP figures from Rosstat, the IMF, and Reuters may still describe Russia as a slowing but growing economy. But the real economy tells a different story: 74% potato inflation, rising food pressure, diesel shortages, machinery problems, and a farming system increasingly squeezed by war.

Russia’s agriculture is exposed to a brutal continental climate. Late snow, sudden heat, drought stress, and disease pressure do not always create one dramatic famine headline. More often, they create something slower and more dangerous: lower yields, higher costs, and rising food prices.

The deeper issue is economic. A war economy does not create real prosperity simply by increasing government spending. It diverts diesel, labor, machinery, capital, and logistics away from productive civilian use. That is why GDP can appear positive on paper while farms, households, and food markets show contraction in reality.

This is the divide I explore: Russian farmers say crisis. Kremlin economists say growth.

As a monetary economist, I do not accept official macroeconomic narratives without asking the basic question: show me the real data. And as someone with hands-on experience in farming — from sugar cane and sweet potatoes in Florida to land in Poland — I know that agriculture reveals economic truth long before official statistics admit it.

Russia’s food system may become one of the clearest weak links in the Kremlin’s war economy.