The global “Starve thy Neighbor” policies continue. First, food exporting countries have been curtailing exports. Now, they are restricting sales of fertilizers, which may come at the expense of expanding output…
Excerpted from William Bi of Bloomberg,
“China, the world's largest grain producer, will increase export duties on all fertilizers and some related raw materials by 100 percentage points to ensure domestic supply for farmers during the main growing season.
“The changes will be effective from April 20 to Sept. 30 and will increase export taxes on fertilizer products to between 100 percent and 135 percent, the Ministry of Finance said in a statement on its Web site today. Current tariffs on fertilizers are zero, 30 percent or 35 percent, depending on the category, according to the site.
“China, grappling with soaring food costs, has boosted subsidies and grain prices to stem declining interest in farming. Lower exports from China, a major supplier of some products such as urea and ammonium phosphate, may further stoke global prices of fertilizers, with some trading at records on demand for food and biofuels.
``The government is sacrificing the fertilizer industry to protect farming,'' as grain production is critical to China's struggle with inflation, Xu Hongzhi, a Beijing-based fertilizer analyst at Beijing Orient Agribusiness Consultant Ltd., said in an interview yesterday.
“If China effectively restricts exporting fertilizers, it could be ``fatal'' to global supplies of some products, such as ammonium phosphate, as it supplies between 20 to 30 percent of global trade volume of the plant feed, Xu said.
Read entire link here.
Nonetheless fertilizer prices have skyrocketed as shown below…
Decyfer DAP Fertilise fob Gulf Coast courtesy of Fullermoney.com
Other fertilizer charts at fullermoney.com…Decyfer MOP Fertiliser Vancouver, Decyfer Sulfur fertiliser fob Vancouver, Morocco Phosphate Rock.
More restrictions equal increased marketplace tensions and political instability…
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