BAKU, Azerbaijan, March 29. Replacing Russian oil and gas will have direct and indirect consequences, Dr. Robert Habeck, Federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Climate Action, Germany, said addressing the Berlin Energy Transition Dialogue, Trend reports.
“We see that with mistakes we made in the past, over the past few years and decades, Germany has led its energy policy in a direction of dependence. This is first of all Germany’s problem, but we may generalize it. I believe that energy policy is not only economic policy. If we think about human history, it has never been so entirely. Energy policy is always a policy of interests of power and by extension, security interests. Reducing Germany’s energy dependence on Russia is very important. It is about 50 percent dependence on Russian coal and gas. Germany and Europe are now becoming independent from Russian fossil fuel step by step. This is necessary for geopolitical reasons. But this will also have direct and indirect consequences. The direct effect is that prices are rising. The inflation is high above expectations. Consumers and companies are suffering from this situation. Despite all the concerns, Germany can overcome this challenge and European economy can so too. Russian energy is also important, there will oil and gas shortage on world markets. It is not very easy to replace Russian energy,” he said.
Habeck went on to add that indirect effects go far beyond this.
“Certain products may not be produced in sufficient quantities. Fertilizers, for example, need a lot of gas. If there is a gas shortage, we may also see a loss in the amount of fertilizers we need to secure global food security combined with loss of wheat from Ukraine and Russia,” he said.
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