Events are moving at pace, but it now looks like there will be no coming back for the former collective farm manager turned defacto post-soviet dictator.
Thoughts are now turning to outside Belarus to see what others may or may not do, lets hope it’s peaceful.
Belarus produces around two million tonnes of wheat at an average yield of three tonnes per hectare, so plenty of scope for improvement should the socio-political landscape become conducive to investment.
It’s been a while since I was last in Belarus so I might be out of touch, but I suspect the biggest constraint on yields will be the low genetic potential of domestic crop varieties, and probably some outdated practices.
You can fix plant genetics almost immediately, by allowing the import of seed, then longer term by investing in plant breeding facilities.
Changing outdated practices, however, would be nigh on impossible while the president cum farm manager cum dictator was still in charge. He was known for driving around and berating farm managers for what he considered to be bad or slovenly work.
I remember on one occasion, somewhere in the northeast of the country on a grey cold October day, talking to an agronomist, I asked him when he put his fertiliser on? “When its delivered” was his honest reply.
Then there was the time we had a late dinner and got absolutely hammered in what turned out to be an abattoir.
So many memories, hope we get the chance to make more.