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Slovenia just became the first European Union country to introduce fuel rationing ...
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| 01. Apr, 2026 |
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QR codes at the pump. Odd-even licence plate systems. Purchase limits per vehicle. The same system Sri Lanka implemented three weeks ago. The same system Bangladesh and Pakistan adopted in early March. The same system that Europeans once watched on their screens as a distant developing-world problem they would never face.
Twenty-four days of war erased the distance between Ljubljana and Colombo.
Europe’s LNG prices have surged 35 to 50 percent since the Strait of Hormuz closed. Qatar’s Ras Laffan, which supplied 17 percent of global LNG capacity, declared Force Majeure after Iranian strikes on Day 3. Repairs will take 3 to 5 years. Russia’s pipeline gas was already severed after Ukraine. Norway is running at maximum output and cannot increase. The EU’s only remaining large-scale supplier is the United States, whose president just told 450 million Europeans to ratify a $750 billion trade deal by Thursday or lose access to American LNG.
Slovenia is small. Two million people. A GDP smaller than some American counties. But Slovenia is the signal. When the first EU member state reaches for QR codes and odd-even plates, the system is telling you that the buffers have failed. Strategic reserves delay rationing. They do not prevent it. Slovenia burned through the delay in 24 days. The question is not whether other EU countries follow. The question is when.
Sri Lanka closed government offices every Wednesday to conserve diesel. LPG vanished from shops on the southern coast. Queues stretched for kilometres. In 2022, Sri Lanka experienced this during a sovereign debt default. In 2026, Sri Lanka is experiencing it during a global war. The cause changed. The queues did not. The island that defaulted four years ago and the continent that lectures it about fiscal discipline are now standing in the same line.
The next line is food. The Strait of Hormuz does not only block oil. It blocks fertiliser. Gulf nations supply 49 percent of the world’s exported urea. Ammonia production requires natural gas that is no longer flowing. Without fertiliser, yields fall 5 to 10 percent on the next planting cycle. The USDA Prospective Plantings report arrives March 31. The FAO Food Price Index publishes April 3. If the strait is still closed when those numbers land, the rationing conversation moves from fuel to food.
The architecture of globalisation was built on a single assumption: the chokepoints will always be open. Hormuz carries 20 percent of the world’s oil. Bab al-Mandab carries the traffic that avoids Hormuz. Suez connects both to Europe. One war closed Hormuz. The Houthis disrupted Bab al-Mandab. Freight analysts say Suez rerouting around the Cape of Good Hope will continue “for another year.” Three chokepoints. All compromised. The system that delivered cheap energy and cheap food to Europe for decades was never resilient. It was lucky. The luck ran out on February 28.
Slovenia is rationing fuel with QR codes. Sri Lanka is rationing fuel with QR codes. The same codes. The same war. The same strait. The only difference is that one country expected this and the other did not.
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Published on  01. Apr, 2026
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