Fertilizing The World

Introduction

Fertilizer is a huge necessity of today’s world. However, with America cutting ties with Russia and all trading exports, America must be more cautious with what we can and cannot grow in our current economy. To keep America running smoothly as a country, this must be a top priority. There are not many plausible solutions outside of being more aware of our resources and that begins with testing our soil and the preservations of our crops. This situation can be prepared to that of the gas prices. As more people began to notice that gas prices were increasing, they started partaking in different actions like driving less, buying more eco-friendly cars, or using public transportation more often. If people take this fertilizer upsurge as seriously as gas prices, this problem could be solved and set up a plethora of solutions for other economic problems.  As small as the problem seems, fertilizer is the center of our economy and must be replenished to keep America running because sooner or not the problem will arise, and we are underprepared.

How This Issue Came About

For anyone that is curious on how this whole problem came about, well the answer in short is Russia invading Ukraine. You may be curious on how that personally affects the United States when it seems we have little to no relevance to Russia and Ukraine, the matter of fact is Russia has a huge effect on our current, thriving economy. With Russia cutting ties to most countries outside of its own, it leaves a massive hole in food markets globally as Russia accounts for roughly 14% of all fertilizer export.¹ After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, most countries, especially western countries have shown little to no respect for Russia. This has led Russia to stop importing very essential needs like oil, steel, and fertilizers to these countries. With the likes of Biden and other Western country leaders, Russia is being isolated from the global trading system after its invasion of Ukraine.² However, not all the blame goes directly to Russia as these fertilizer prices have been increasing since the start of 2020.³ Within the past 30 years there has been two exponential booms in the fertilizer industry. One in 2008 and one recently in 2021.⁴ 

This has been a sneaky concern previously and is one yet again. If nothing is down to preserve fertilizer, it can stay at this relative rate and maybe even increase to a more dangerous standard.

The Global Effect

There are many problems with the increase of fertilizer. The main concerns are the cost of food is going to increase, or the amount of food being sold is going to decrease. The invasion of Russia has caused the prices of grain to increase by nearly 20% and fertilizer by 14% and further inflates food costs.⁵ This is only the beginning because if crops like grains are increasing in cost, it is only a matter of time until various fruits, vegetables, etc. also increase. Also increasing drastically are the average cost of compounds, especially the ones that are associated with fertilizer. Fertilizer consists of many different elements like for example, ammonia, nitrogen, nitrates, phosphates, and sulphates, etc. However, within the last year, the prices for these materials have increased by an astounding 30%.⁶ A 30% increase is a drastic change, especially within a year as it causes people to change their lifestyle and adapt to new ways of living.

Paragraphs obviously aren’t finished but you can kind of gather what direction everything is heading in. Any feedback would be beneficial, thank you. Also don’t worry I will be making a better title soon.