Fertilizer market

Worldwide, triple superphosphate, over the period 1955 to 1980, maintained about a 15% share of the phosphate fertilizer market (Fig. 8). World consumption for the year ended June 30, 1991 (9) was equivalent to 3.6 x 10 t of P20, which was about 10% of world fertilizer P2O5 consumption. In the United States, consumption for the year ended June 30, 1990 (Fig. 7) was equivalent to about 240 x 10 t of P20, which represented only 6% of U.S. fertilizer P2O5 consumption. 

Asahi Chemical Industries uses this process to coat N—P—K fertilizers, marketed as Long, High Control, and Nutricote. 

In early 2002 the European Fertilizer Manufacturers Association (EFMA) estimated that between 2002 and 2012, nitrogen fertilizer use would fall by 6 percent in the EU. With the Commission s proposals mentioned above, the decline could be slightly more than forecast. Executives at some fertilizer producers have also said that the Commission s proposals will result in even more stagnation in the European fertilizer market than had previously been expected149. 

In an effort to stabilize earnings in the cyclical nitrogen products market, Potash Corp has decided to emphasize industrial sales (rather than agricultural sales) from their North American production base and use low-cost production in Trinidad to supply the North American fertilizer market. Since initiating this strategy in 1997, they have increased industrial sales of nitrogen products from 25% of production to 55% of nitrogen sales in 2001153. 

The fertilizer market was in no better shape than the petrochemicals and chemical fibers markets, for world producers had largely allowed supply to exceed demand. 

Electrolyzers are today commercially viable only in selected industrial gas applications (excepting various noncommercial military and aerospace applications). Commercial applications include the previously mentioned remote fertilizer market in which natural gas feedstock is not available. The other major commercial market for electrolysis today is the distributed, or merchant, industrial hydrogen market. This merchant market involves hydrogen delivered by truck in various containers. Large containers are referred to as tube trailers. An industrial gas company will deliver a full tube trailer to a customer and take the empty trailer back for refilling. Customers with smaller-scale requirements are served by cylinders that are delivered by truck and literally installed by hand. 

Lithium, sodium, and potassium, and their compounds, are of considerable biochemical and industrial importance. " Lithium salts can control manic-depressive psychoses, the Na+/K+ concentration ratio is crucial to nerve impulse transmission, and potassium formulations dominate the plant fertilizer market. Lithium and its salts are used in the production of high-strength and low-density alloys, of lubricating... 

L. Maene, The nitrogen fertilizer markets of Asiain global context - status and outlook , Asia Nitrogen 98, British Sulphur International Conference, Kuala Lumpur, 1998, Feb 22-24. 

The bulk of the fertilizer market demand is for the two Coarse grades, necessitating some compaction of the finer grades to produce these. Passage of the finer Standard and Soluble grades of material through closely spaced steel rollers under pressure forms a fused sheet of potassium chloride, because of the plastic nature of this salt. This fused sheet is then broken up and rescreened to raise the proportion of Granular and Coarse products produced. 

Six of the 15 largest volume inorganic chemicals produced in the U.S. in 1995 directly or indirectly form part of all the various chemical fertilizer formulations produced (Table 1.4). Such is the importance and significance of the fertilizer market in terms of the overall volume of activity of the chemical process industries. 

Urea-Ammonium Nitrate Solutions. An important fertilizer is the urea-ammonium nitrate solution which makes up 20% of the nitrogen fertilizer market. This fertilizer utilizes the unusually high solubility between urea and ammonium nitrate (Table 3.15), which allows for a high nitrogen content, low nitrogen cost, and ease of handling. The solution also can contain herbicides since they can be easily added to the solution. However, these solutions are corrosive, so corrosion inhibitors are added such as ammonium thiocyanate, sodium arsenite, sulfonate OA5, or trace ammonia. 

The most successful of the artificial slowly-available fertilizers marketed to date are the ureaforms. These compounds resist attack by microorganisms and release their nitrogen over a period of several weeks. They are used now to a considerable extent, and with considerable satisfaction, on golf courses, lawns, rdens and special crops. The cost of the ureaforms, like other slowly-available materials, is considerably higher than other common forms of nitrogen and their general use is prohibited for this reason. 

Although fertilizer production has decreased drastically in recent years, these markets, especially Eurasia, are rich in raw materials such as natural gas, potash ores, and phosphate rock. Therefore, they will continue to play an important role in supplying nitrogen and potash fertilizers in the global markets. Because Eastern Europe is not as rich in energy resources and raw materials, increased energy costs may reduce its comparative advantage in world fertilizer markets. 

Eurasia also improved its position as a net exporter by increasing net exports from 3.0 million tonnes in 1979/80 to 9.3 million tonnes in 1992/93. A drastic fall in domestic use has further strengthened its position. Eastern Europe s net imports decreased over time, and as a result of a drastic reduction in domestic use, it has become a net exporter in the world fertilizer market. 

Supply-demand balance estimates suggest that fertilizer markets during the late 1990s will be dominated by "surpluses under most scenarios and therefore will continue to put downward pressures on prices. However, in... 

With a reduction of 26%, nitrophosphates were more severely affected by the crisis than the average of fertilizers. The reason for this seems to be that their main market was in Europe, where the fertilizer market decreased more than the world average under the combined influences of fertilizer use restrictions in Western Europe and farm economy disturbances in Eastern Europe and Russia. 

In some settings, large centralized blending plants are most appropriate. For example, in Ireland nine relatively large blending plants, each with an annual production ranging from 50,000 to 250,000 tonnes, supply about I 50%-55% of the total Irish fertilizer market [8]. 

Secondary nutrients are an important component of the fluid fertilizer market, and many source materials are available for use in clear solution and suspension formulations. Most of the materials for clear solutions may also be used in suspensions, but they are seldom used because they are generally more expensive. The polysulfide solutions should not be mixed with acidic materials - dangerous hydrogen sulfide gas may be evolved The following list gives secondary nutrient sources for solutions and suspensions are [9] ... 

A detailed review of international fertilizer market trends has been given in Chapter 3. 

Propose a strategy for fertilizer market development and establishment of an effective distribution network, promoting regional fertilizer consumption. 

Mudahar, M. S. 1984. Fertilizer Prices and Subsidies Policy, (unpublished), IFDC Fertilizer Marketing Management Programme, IFDC, Muscle Shoals, AL, U.S.A. 

Next, deregulation of fertilizer marketing and trade liberalization motivated public companies to further reduce production costs. A new network of private dealers and traders was established to compete with tiie state system. In several countries where divestiture and subsidy removal has been immediate, short-term fertilizer use and production declined significantly therefore, the whole system requires time for adji Btment and achievement of a new balance. 

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