Fertilizer Prices To Drop In Summer

Producers can expect lower fertilizer prices later this year, but the president and senior economist with NPK Fertilizer Advisory Services says prices will move higher during seeding.

"We're expecting a bump in prices as we go into what is the heaviest use period of the year, but once we get through that we expect prices to come under pressure and drop down through the summer," says David Asbridge. "It's a good possibility that 2013 prices could be even lower than they are now."

"When you have high prices you tend to bring more production capacity on, and that's what we're seeing," he says. "We're seeing a lot of phosphate expansion come on in Saudi Arabia. Potash capacity is growing here in Canada, as well as in Russia. So we're looking at situation where there's a lot of capacity coming on stream."

"We're looking at prices across the board - nitrogen, phosphate and potash - to go down this summer," he says.

But before that, Asbridge says prices will peak in spring. He says producers and retailers have been reluctant to buy fertilizer this winter.