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WTO fertiliser warning over strait of Hormuz closure: 'Harvests shrink and prices rise'
Disruptions to international fertiliser supplies caused by the closing of the strait of Hormuz will cause food scarcity and high prices, the World Trade Organisation’s deputy director general, Jean-Marie Paugam, told Agence France-Press.
A third of the world’s fertilisers normally transit the strait, which has been virtually closed by Iran since the start of the war.
Paugam said there would be an impact on both quantity and prices. “The effect compounds the following year: harvests shrink and prices rise,” he said.
The gulf has ample supplies of natural gas, a key ingredient in artificial fertilisers, but production has been severely impeded by the war, with several facilities forced to shut down.
Major food exporters like India, Thailand and Brazil depend on exports of urea, a nitrogen-based fertiliser. There is currently no fertiliser shortage, Paugum said, but as the conflict drags on “we will feel a direct impact on supplies to major producer countries just as planting season begins for the crops that will be harvested next year”.
Countries which import most of their food would be in a very bad position, according to Paugum, including parts of west and north Africa. The effect would be amplified if countries begin stockpiling, as occurred during the Covid pandemic.
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