Grain producers, agriculture analysts, traders, and farm groups across the globe all express concern about the cost and availability of fertilizer.
said last week that a number of developing countries face near-term wheat supply shortages due to their high dependence on Ukrainian exports.
Brazil, the world’s biggest soybean exporter, relies heavily on imported fertilizers such as potash, which accounted for 38% of the crop nutrients it used last year. Russia and Belarus were the source of half of those shipments. Giacomelli said fertilizer is hard to get and that some dealers won’t finalize sales until cargo ships dock in Brazil. He’s still kicking himself for not closing a purchase he was negotiating just before Russia invaded Ukraine. “I got distracted and now am paying more,” Giacomelli said.
It’s the same in rural Kenya. Farmer Mary Kamau said she, too, has slashed purchases of commercial fertilizer and is using manure to nourish the coffee and avocados she grows on 12 acres in Murang’a County. She worries about the consequences for her family. “Planting decisions are increasingly being made not on market fundamentals but rather on the cost of production driven by the price and supply of fertilizer,” dozens of US lawmakers wrote in a March 17 letter to the US International Trade Commission. They were seeking relief from duties on fertilizer imports from Morocco and Trinidad and Tobago.