Fertiliser prices a mixed bag for farmers

Ravensdown is a farmer-owned fertiliser co-operative in Awatoto, Napier. Photo / NZME.

Volatility on world fertiliser markets and the decline in the New Zealand dollar has brought with it a mixed bag of price changes for farmers.

Ravensdown said urea prices had fallen by $14 to $575 per tonne while superphosphate rose $4 to $320 a tonne and di-ammonium phosphate (DAP) is up by $50 to $865.

"While recent months have seen a general decline in the price of urea, it has been volatile with a recent firming particularly due to demand from India and Pakistan," the farmer-owned co-operative said.

Prices, it said, were now expected to stabilise at current levels.

"The global decline in urea prices has offset a significant fall in the US dollar, however for other key farm inputs like superphosphate and DAP the change is a net increase."

Ravensdown's purchases in US dollars have been influenced by the decline of the New Zealand dollar.

"When combined with international commodity increases such as for phosphate rock, this has led to the increases," said Bryan Inch, Ravensdown's general manager of customer relationships. "For products like potash we continue to purchase on favourable terms, so that product is being kept steady for now and remains at $670 per tonne."

The co-operative's focus was to buy well for the benefit of its farmer-shareholders in the face of global volatility. He said optimising pasture production with tactical use of nitrogen to provide the cheapest source of feed, and avoid importing feed, was another tool farmers were turning to.