click here<\/a>\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\nAmid criticism of extreme volatility in the fertilizer industry, especially over the last five years, Rosenbusch emphasized the market’s global aspect. \u201cFertilizer is a globally traded commodity that is subject to fierce competition and global supply and demand.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Disruption due to war in the Middle East, for example, damaged or slowed 31 ammonia plants, while 49 plants in South Asia were shuttered due to disruption of natural gas supplies out of the Middle East, he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cSo even with the Strait [of Hormuz] reopening, we do not know the extent of the damage to those production facilities,\u201d he said. \u201cThese issues really just exacerbated what was already a very tight global supply.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Also throwing the market into wild price swings are restricted exports from China, the world\u2019s biggest fertilizer producer, plant damage in Russia and overall strong demand for crop nutrients, Rosenbusch said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Senate Ag Chairman John Boozman, R-Ark., noted that proposals to make the U.S. fertilizer industry more resilient may boost production and bring down prices in the long term. More immediately, Congress must provide additional financial aid to American farmers to help them get through the current year.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, the committee\u2019s top Democrat, said\u00a0farmers need policies that encourage new investment, reduce supply disruptions and improve transparency in the fertilizer market.<\/p>\n
Andy Green, principal and senior adviser at Center Market Strategies, a bipartisan group focused on combating business monopolies, criticized the government\u2019s tolerance for a highly concentrated fertilizer market.\u00a0<\/p>\n
High sustained increases in profits should \u201cbe cause for antitrust scrutiny in light of market shocks that are repeating today,\u201d he said, adding that the government might want to reconsider recent mergers in the sector.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Trent Kubik, a farmer and president of the South Dakota Corn Growers Association, questioned what\u2019s causing higher prices of nitrogen in the U.S. despite the relatively low cost of natural gas, a critical fertilizer input and feedstock.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cMarket power has allowed manufacturers to maintain higher prices at the expense of the U.S. farmer,\u201d he said. \u201cSimply put, farmers need more competition in this marketplace.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Nebraska entrepreneur Joshua Westling, who is leading the development of a domestic fertilizer facility called Project Meadowlark in Nebraska that represents more than $1 billion in project investment, urged lawmakers to do more to increase fertilizer supplies in the U.S.<\/p>\n
\u201cCongress needs to take bold action,\u201d he said in prepared testimony. \u201cTo do that, we need a clear federal commitment to invest in our nation’s fertilizer production infrastructure, which will signal to the private market that these billion-dollar-plus projects are worth investing in because they are critical to our national security.\u201d<\/p>\n
Westling also called for predictable trade policy on fertilizer inputs.<\/p>\n
\u201cSignificant trade policy volatility on fertilizer inputs creates underwriting challenges for new projects,\u201d he said. \u201cI would respectfully suggest that any legislative consideration of trade policy on fertilizer take into account the impact on projects in development as well as projects in operation.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lawmakers queried witnesses on U.S. fertilizer industry concentration in a Senate Ag Committee hearing. Senate Majority Leader John…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":70514,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[142],"tags":[477,14669,475,40731,40730,40732],"class_list":{"0":"post-70513","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-john-thune","8":"tag-congress","9":"tag-fertilizer","10":"tag-john-thune","11":"tag-senate-agriculture-committee","12":"tag-the-fertilizer-institute","13":"tag-usda"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@people\/116571348797347023","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70513","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70513"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70513\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70514"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70513"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70513"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70513"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}