Falling price of fertiliser causes headaches for producers
Falling price of fertiliser causes headaches for producers
Fertiliser prices experienced a significant decline within the year's first three months, a boon for farmers who were able to reap the benefits, though production enterprises find themselves grappling with challenges.
The market has continued to witness a sharp drop in prices, with urea fertiliser currently at its lowest price point in over two years. As a result of domestic production, enterprises now have an excess of urea that they can export.
DAP, NPK and potassium fertiliser prices have decreased but are still high.
Prices of many fertilisers are likely to decline due to abundant supply and a sharp drop in world fertiliser prices.
According to the Viet Nam Fertiliser Association, fertiliser prices are falling rapidly as the cost of natural gas, an important raw material for fertiliser production, and farmers' demand both decrease.
After China started reopening and no longer restricted the export of 29 types of fertilisers, the supply of fertiliser on the world market was no longer in short supply.
Though fertiliser prices rose in proportion to the world oil and gas price at the beginning of last year, the price of fertilisers has decreased sharply, especially urea, from the fourth quarter of last year.
As the output selling price is low and slow, inventory pressure and financial costs are extremely large, and profit margins are falling rapidly.
Vu Xuan Hong, Deputy General Director of Lam Thao Fertilisers And Chemicals JSC, shared that the drop in fertiliser prices helped farmers reduce difficulties, especially in the context of high fertiliser prices in the last two years.
However, the current situation also puts great pressure on fertiliser enterprises, especially agent systems.
As the price fluctuated week by week, day by day, many farmers were waiting for further price drops to buy, Hong said.
He added that some dealers bought fertiliser when the price was still high, but the price was decreasing daily, and the goods were sold slowly, so there was a lot of inventory.
This is forcing fertiliser enterprises to find solutions to their difficulties, said Hong.
Supe Lam Thao has also been implementing a series of solutions such as reducing production costs to help lower product costs, improving technology and especially launching new fertiliser products, which were suitable for a variety of crops, said Hong.
