Poland is leaning toward a decision to compensate nitrogen fertilizer producers for losses they would incur while offering their products to the country’s farmers at “stable” prices, the PAP newswire reported, citing Agriculture Minister Henryk Kowalczyk, speaking in a news briefing.
Nitrogen fertilizer producer Grupa Azoty SA and subsidiary Grupa Azoty Puławy last week said they have offered their customers new, much lower prices of nitrogen fertilizers, after resuming nitrogen fertilizer production earlier this month in response to a change in market conditions (GM Oct. 21, p. 31). Another of Azoty’s subsidiaries, Grupa Azoty Kędzierzyn, relaunched fertilizer production at full capacity on Oct. 21 (see separate news story).
Azoty had said the prices of nitrogen fertilizers significantly below the Pln4,000 per mt (approximately $842 at current exchange rates) mark are “what the market expects,” allowing the continuation of economically viable agricultural production.
Poland’s other nitrogen fertilizer producer, Anwil SA, a unit of Poland’s biggest oil refiner, PKN Orlen SA, restarted fertilizer production in late August “despite difficult macroeconomic conditions” in order “to guarantee food security” in the country (GM Sept. 2, p. 1), after temporarily suspending fertilizer production on Aug. 23 due to the unprecedented increase of natural gas prices in Europe (GM Aug. 26, p. 1).
At the time of the production restart, Anwil said the price of its fertilizers once production resumed would reflect the current price of natural gas and market conditions. (see separate news story).
The Polish government in March implemented a Pln3.9 billion program of subsidies for fertilizer purchases by the country’s farmers to protect them against high fertilizer prices (GM March 25, p. 29). In August, the government said it may extend these fertilizer subsidies into 2023.