The Phosphate Crisis - Part Two

This is Tim Hammerich of the Ag Information Network with your Farm of the Future Report.

Geopolitical conflict has put a strain on fertilizer supply chains, not least of which being phosphate products. We do have domestic supplies of phosphate here in the U.S. but Itafos CEO David Delaney says the manufacturing process requires sulfur.

Delaney… “ What's happened this year is the war in Iran and the closing of the Strait of Hormuz has tied up about forty-five percent of global sulfur. And you need sulfur to acidulate phosphate rock to make fertilizer. So you've got almost half of the world's sulfur supply stuck or not running, and you have a severe shortage of sulfur, which has increased sulfur prices dramatically, highest level in recorded history. And then with the Russian-Ukraine war and drone warfare, oil refineries have been hit. So, you know, sulfur is a by-product of refinery production. You got a lack of sulfur. So they have quit exporting sulfur. Turkey has quit exporting sulfur. Kazakhstan has quit exporting sulfur. So there's just a big squeeze.”

This sulfur squeeze is a major factor in what Delaney calls the global phosphate crisis.