Trump's Trials - War with Iran disrupts fertilizer exports as US farmers prepare for planting season

Episode Date: March 23, 2026

Gulf states are major fertilizer producers and the war with Iran has triggered a 25% price hike, just as struggling U.S. farmers are planting corn. Support NPR and hear every episode of Trump's Terms sponsor-free with NPR+. Sign up at plus.npr.org.To manage podcast ad preferences, review the links below:See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

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Along with oil and gas, the war has also pushed up prices for fertilizer. That's because half the world's nitrogen fertilizer exports squeezed through the state of Hormuz. Frank Morris of member station KCUR reports on the consequences. In Kansas, it's getting close to planting time. But before the seeds go into the ground, people like Matt Yubel are busy prepping the soil with fertilizer. Right now, we're kind of, we'll be in the sixth. of it and a lot of nitrogen gets put on in the spring. But that nitrogen fertilizer is way more expensive than it was three weeks ago.

It shot up about 30% when the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran. Farmers buy the stuff by the ton. Many of them lost money last year. And Yulville says quite a few of them were putting off buying fertilizer this spring. I think guys were holding on a little bit here coming into the spring, thinking that we were going to trend down. Gas prices were down, you know, and that all kind of trends together. and so this probably threw some guys for a loot.

It takes lots of natural gas to produce urea, a key nitrogen fertilizer. That's why so much of it comes from oil-rich states shipping it through the Strait of Hermuz. Josh Linville, Vice President of Fertilizer at the brokerage firm Stone X, says closing the straight has triggered a massive supply shock. If you had sat us down before and said, hey, I want you to think of the nightmare scenario for fertilizer, what would it be? It would be this exact event during this exact time of year. The Fertilizer Institute predicts that American farmers are going to be short some 2 million tons of fertilizer this spring. The U.S. makes a lot of its own nitrogen fertilizer, but doesn't make it fast enough to cover the spring planting surge. Many other countries will face much bigger shortages.

To make matters worse, the war also cut shipments of fundamental ingredients like liquefied natural gas and sulfur to some of the world's top fertilizer producers. Countries like India, second biggest urea producer in the world, their production rates are starting to fall. Pakistan, China, all of these major producing countries are struggling to get these gas supplies. And all of a sudden, they're having to say, well, we've only got to pill much. We need to lower our fertilizer production to put it into some of these other industries. In response, the Trump administration has lifted restrictions on Venezuelan fertilizer imports. Here's U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rawlins speaking outside the White House just a few days ago. The president is very aware of these challenges and these issues.

we are looking at every potential avenue to keep the fertilizer costs down as these farmers are going into planting season. But rebuilding the fertilizer supply chain will be tricky. Fertilizer plants tend to run at full capacity, and they take years to build. Veronica 9, chief economist at the Fertilizer Institute, says Iran was the third largest nitrogen fertilizer exporter. So how long does it take until we get back to normal? It could be a while. Meantime, farmers will probably have a lot less fertilizer. On the one hand, that could be good for the environment.

Less fertilizer, less fertilizer runoff, polluting water supplies and fueling toxic algae blooms. But Nye says it'll also mean less to eat all around the world. What our product is used for is food, the production of food, so that the consequences aren't going to be immediate, but they could be substantial. Nyses the fertilizer shock will nudge up food prices in the United States. the effects on farmers and other citizens of more vulnerable countries are likely to be much worse. For NPR News, I'm Frank Morris in Kansas City. Before we wrap up a reminder, you can find more coverage of the Trump administration on the NPR Politics podcast,

where you can hear NPR's political reporters break down the day's biggest political news with new episodes every weekday afternoon. And thanks, as always, to our NPR Plus supporters who hear every episode of the show without sponsor messages. You can learn more at plus.npr.org. I'm Scott Detrow. Thanks for listening to Trump's terms from NPR.