2022 was another very good year for Nutrien, the world’s largest crop nutrient company. The Canadian-headquartered fertilizer giant produces around 27 million tonnes of potash, nitrogen and phosphate products annually from operations and investments in 14 countries, distributing these to agricultural, industrial and feed customers across the globe. Its agriculture retail business, Nutrien Ag Solutions, also serves more than 500,000 farmers worldwide.
As it is an involuntary product, sulphur tends to be sold at whatever price the producer can get for it. This means that one of the major determinants of the sulphur price is the cost of transporting it to the customer, and in this regard one of the key indices is the Baltic Dry Index (BDI), which measures the cost of shipping dry bulk goods around the world, reported daily by the Baltic Exchange in London. The BDI has been on quite an excursion over the past couple of years – perhaps not as wild as the period from 2004-2009 when everyone wanted to ship goods to and from China, there was a shortage of vessels to carry it, and oil prices were at record highs - but eye-catching nevertheless.
China has been the major market for base metals, including copper, nickel, lead and zinc over the past two decades as the country rapidly industrialised. But with China’s growth slowing due to demographics and market saturation, where are metals markets and production of/demand for sulphuric acid likely to go next?
Continuing growth in energy uses indicate robust demand for methanol over the coming years, but the current slate of new projects does not look sufficient to meet it. Is methanol approaching a supply crunch?
On March 20th this year, just as this issue was going to print, the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued its Synthesis Report, one of its 5-7 yearly comprehensive assessments of how the world’s climate is changing and what needs to be done to ameliorate it. In spite of all of the progress that has been made since the 5th Synthesis Report in 2017, the IPCC notes that: “the pace and scale of what has been done so far, and current plans, are insufficient to tackle climate change.” While the body believes that keeping warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels is still possible, it is not likely unless work to decarbonise proceeds more rapidly. In particular, the IPCC suggests that CO2 and equivalent emissions need to fall by 43% by 2030 compared with 2019 values, and 60% by 2035 to achieve this goal.
Brazil’s agricultural industry continues to expand at the same time that most of its nitrogen fertilizer industry has shut down. Meanwhile, Venezuela continues to deal with the consequences of years of underinvestment and mismanagement, and elsewhere, gas discoveries in other parts of the continent have not led to the new plant construction boom that had once been hoped for.
We look ahead at fertilizer industry prospects for the next 12 months, including the key economic and agricultural drivers likely to shape the market during 2023.
More than 650 delegates from 326 companies and 56 countries gathered at the Hotel RIU Plaza España, Madrid, Spain, 17-19 October 2022, for the Argus Fertilizer Europe 2022 conference.
After two turbulent years, could the fertilizer market finally start to stabilise in 2023? Well, that’s what Dutch agricultural finance house Rabobank is predicting…
The global potash market has endured a tumultuous 18 months, says Andy Hemphill, senior editor for potash and sulphuric acid at ICIS Fertilizers. Export sanctions, high offer prices and buyer unrest persist as we enter 2023.