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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
World
Joanna Partridge. Graphics by Lucy Swan, Paul Scruton and Harvey Symons

‘Food security timebomb’: a visual guide to the Gulf fertiliser blockade

Farmer driving a tractor harvesting a field of wheat
The wheat harvest in Pakistan, one of the biggest importers of Gulf fertilisers. Photograph: Bloomberg/Getty Images

The world has become well versed in the importance of the strait of Hormuz to the world’s energy flows, but attention is increasingly turning to its vital role in another market – the fertiliser on which harvests depend.

A third of the global trade in raw materials for fertiliser passes through the maritime choke point, which is also the route for 20% of shipments of natural gas, which is required to make it.

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