(Bloomberg) -- United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres stressed the importance of renewing the key Black Sea grain deal during a visit to Kyiv, with the current accord soon set to expire.

The latest 120-day run of the Black Sea Grain Initiative — which has enabled the shipment of more than 20 million tons of Ukrainian crops since it was agreed in July — ends on March 18. It can be extended if no sides seek to terminate or modify it, though a renewal is yet to be confirmed.

“I want to underscore the critical importance of the rollover of the Black Sea Grain Initiative,” Guterres said on Wednesday during a press conference with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy. “It contributed to lowering the global cost of food and has offered critical relief to people, who are also paying the high price for this war, particularly in the developing world.” 

The deal has helped push down food-commodity costs that soared to a record after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine initially disrupted trade flows. While Ukraine’s harvests have been battered by the war, it’s still an agricultural heavyweight and ranks among the world’s top shippers of staples from sunflower oil to wheat and corn.

The visit marked Guterres’s third trip to Ukraine in the last year, his spokesman said in a statement Tuesday.

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