By Mary Hartney
In testimony delivered to the U.S. Senate Agriculture Committee during the “Perspectives on the Fertilizer Industry: Ensuring a Stable and Affordable Supply for American Producers” hearing, The Fertilizer Institute (TFI) offered some recommendations.
TFI President and Chief Executive Officer Corey Rosenbusch prefaced his remarks by explaining how the fertilizer industry is caught up in the current geopolitical crisis.
The Iran conflict’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz has choked off roughly a third of the world’s exported fertilizers. Meanwhile, sulfur costs — essential for producing phosphate fertilizers — have skyrocketed more than 1,000% since early 2025, driven by supply shocks from Russia and the Middle East. China, the world’s largest fertilizer producer, has extended bans on exports through at least August 2026 of the world’s three most vital dry phosphate fertilizers. This includes monoammonium phosphate, diammonium phosphate and triple superphosphate. Russia’s war in Ukraine continues to disrupt supply chains.
The cumulative effect is a global market under pressure unlike anything seen in recent memory.
For Florida specifically, the stakes are enormous. The state is a major phosphate producer, yet even domestic producers are hamstrung by soaring input costs, permitting delays that stretch a decade and foreign competitors propped up by subsidies.
The prescription for fixing this isn’t a single silver bullet. It’s a combination of the U.S. government, fertilizer producers and growers all working together on short- and long-term solutions.
Short-Term Actions Needed:
- Negotiating preferential safe passage for fertilizer-carrying vessels through the Strait of Hormuz
- Deploying the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation and the Export-Import Bank to provide cargo and hull insurance for fertilizer shipments
- Temporarily redirecting liquified natural gas exports to support fertilizer-producing nations like India, Pakistan, Egypt and Bangladesh, preventing further nitrogen production shutdowns that strain global availability and drive up U.S. import prices
- Extending and expanding the Jones Act waiver for fertilizer transportation, allowing a broader pool of vessels to move fertilizer and inputs between domestic ports and easing seasonal bottlenecks
- Securing reliable import channels for phosphoric acid, ammonia, urea, sulfur and sulfuric acid from allied nations including Venezuela and Turkey, diversifying away from conflict-affected supply routes
- Providing regulatory flexibility during peak fertilizer movement windows, including hours-of-service exemptions for truckers and prioritized barge and rail scheduling to prevent distribution bottlenecks
- Ensuring seamless U.S.-Canada trade continuity, particularly for potash, of which Canada is the world’s single largest producer accounting for 86% of U.S. potash imports
Other Potential Actions Include, But Not Limited To:
- Establishing a full-time U.S. Department of Agriculture crop inputs economist within the Office of the Chief Economist to provide timely, transparent market analysis to give farmers the forward visibility they need for planting and budgeting decisions
- Enacting broad permitting reform to dramatically compress fertilizer project timelines
- Expanding the Section 45X production tax credit to cover phosphate and potash — now designated as Critical Minerals — thus incentivizing domestic mining investment and reducing dependence on foreign-controlled sources
- Modernizing the farm bill to include programs that help farmers offset the upfront costs of new fertilizer technologies
- Incentivizing adoption of 4R Nutrient Stewardship practices — applying nutrients from the right source, at the right rate, at the right time and in the right place
- Legalizing and expanding beneficial reuse of phosphogypsum, turning waste into a resource
Growers understand resilience. They rebuild after storms and freezes and find a way to keep growing. The fertilizer crisis gripping American agriculture demands that same spirit. Let’s work together — our domestic food security depends on this.
See Rosenbusch’s written report at is.gd/TFIreport for more information.
Mary Hartney is president of the Florida Fertilizer & Agrichemical Association.