Fertilizer trade globe
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Flows on the globe for the selected product, given the layers, by value
Key points
World exports of mineral fertilizers in 2024 totaled about $96 bn: phosphate and compound — $41 bn, nitrogen — $34 bn, potash — $20 bn. The market is highly concentrated: Canada and Russia account for 57% of world potash exports, Morocco for 23% of phosphate and compound fertilizers, and Russia for 14% of nitrogen fertilizers. The largest buyer is Brazil, with 15% of world fertilizer imports.
Seaborne shipments total about $59 bn a year. The key maritime chokepoints are Gibraltar (~$13 bn), the English Channel and the Suez Canal (~$12 bn each), and Bab-el-Mandeb (~$11 bn). For nitrogen fertilizers the Strait of Hormuz is critical: 98% of Qatar’s exports and 82% of Saudi Arabia’s pass through it, and Bangladesh receives almost all of its imports through it. The Danish Straits carry 57% of Russian nitrogen fertilizer exports.
Importance of straits
Click “Close strait” in the list below or select a strait on the globe. The model shows how much trade passes through it and which countries depend on it most: importers are highlighted in red, exporters in orange. The more saturated the color, the larger the share of the country’s trade that passes through the strait.
Straits and canals
Estimated value of seaborne shipments through each strait in the selected layer. The “Close strait” button shows whose trade depends on it.
Click a flow, country, strait or hub on the globe
About the data
Data. Source: BACI (CEPII), a reconciled database of bilateral trade based on UN Comtrade, 2024 (accessed via OEC). Layers: “Nitrogen” — HS heading 3102 (urea, ammonium nitrate, ammonium sulfate, etc.); “Potash” — 3104 (potassium chloride and sulfate); “Phosphate and compound” — 3103 and 3105 (superphosphates, diammonium and monoammonium phosphate, NPK, etc.). Ammonia and phosphate rock are covered in the chemicals and minerals globes.
What is shown. The globe shows the 70 largest sea flows and the 25 largest overland flows. Strait estimates cover all flows from $15 m — 87–88% of world trade in each layer. When a strait is closed, country lists include countries with trade in the layer of at least 0.1% of the world total (and at least $50 m).
Mode of transport. Trade between neighboring countries (within Europe and North America, China with its neighbors including Central Asia, within Southeast Asia, etc.) is treated as overland. For other flows, the sea share is taken from Eurostat statistics on EU trade with distant countries for 2024: fertilizers are carried almost entirely by sea (99.5%).
Routes and importance of straits. A route is the shortest path between the countries’ main ports over the network of sea lanes. A strait’s importance for a country is the share of its shipments through the strait in its total imports or exports of the product group. When a strait is closed, the model looks for a detour and estimates how much longer it is (at an average vessel speed of 14 knots); if there is no detour, the shipment is considered cut off.
Limitations. This is a computational model, not vessel-tracking data. Routes run between the countries’ main ports, not between specific terminals; the actual split of Russian and Belarusian exports between Baltic, Black Sea and Far East ports may differ from the model.
WhiteIndex. Fertilizer Trade Globe (October 2026). Data: BACI (CEPII) based on UN Comtrade, 2024; Eurostat.
All sources
BACI (CEPII) based on UN Comtrade, 2024
This text was translated automatically from Russian. Figures, years, names and sources are as in the original.
Exports of nitrogen, potash, phosphate and compound fertilizers in 2024: sea routes and the role of straits in world trade