Ag Report: Farmers look to manure as fertilizer prices increase
COLUMBUS, Ohio — The coronavirus pandemic, inflation and Russia’s war against Ukraine are all driving up the price of fertilizer, and that increase is forcing farmers to look for alternatives. Manure may be the solution.
“When you think about how farmers go about producing food and the different fertilizers, the different inputs, rather, that go into producing a crop, fertilizer is one of the most important because it’s the fuel, if you will, for what gets a crop like, say, corn to grow. You’ve got, seed, land fuel for the tractors, but then another of the most prevalent expenses is fertilizer, particularly nitrogen-based fertilizer,” agriculture expert Andy Vance said.
The USDA estimates an annual price increase of 235% for anhydrous ammonia, 149% for urea and 192% for liquid nitrogen – all primary forms of nitrogen fertilizer.
“And so as I talk with farmers, as I follow them on social media, that’s one of the huge cost increases that they’ve seen. And we’re talking, you know, increases in the 100 to 300% range. I mean, significant increases year over year when they’re comparing budgets from last year,” Vance said.
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