Amid challenges, Brazil projects record fertilizer deliveries in 2025

Despite a challenging year, Brazil is expected to close 2025 with fertilizer deliveries totaling 48.2 million tonnes, according to a forecast presented by Agrinvest at the 19th Sindiadubos NPK 2025 Symposium held last Thursday (30) in Curitiba. The event brought together 1,100 participants from across Brazil and abroad. “It’s already clear that this will be a record volume of products. Some data still need to be confirmed, but at this point, we see an increase of 1% compared to 2024,” said agronomist and fertilizer analyst Jeferson Souza from Agrinvest.

Although a historic result is expected for 2025, the market has shown atypical behavior, according to Aluisio Schwartz Teixeira, president of the Paraná Association of Fertilizer and Agricultural Limestone Industries (Sindiadubos-PR). “There’s no doubt the volume of fertilizer delivered will increase this year, but there’s been a shift in import patterns: prices have been rising gradually, and with tighter margins, Brazilian farmers bought products with lower nutrient concentrations, mainly from China,” he explained.

According to Teixeira, China’s exports of simple superphosphate to Brazil doubled year over year (from 300,000 to 600,000 tonnes), NP fertilizers (containing nitrogen and phosphorus) rose from 900,000 to 2 million tonnes, and ammonium sulfate (with nitrogen and sulfur) increased by 1.5 million tonnes.

Brazilian Fertilizer Imports | January–August | 2022–2025 | WTMT

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“The country is importing large quantities of lower-concentration products — meaning it needs greater volumes to meet demand. We project a decline in phosphorus imports, and there’s uncertainty over whether nitrogen and potassium deliveries will grow this year,” said Souza. Currently, Brazil imports more than 85% of its fertilizer needs, mainly from Russia, China, Canada, and Iran. Even with lower nutrient content, Souza believes productivity will not be affected. “We are reducing P₂O₅ (phosphorus) application rates on Brazilian soils, but there are still some reserves since our soils have been well supplied in recent years,” he noted.

Challenges and outlook
The sharp increase in fertilizer imports from China over a short period created long unloading queues at the Port of Paranaguá this year, with an average waiting time of 60 days. “This caused a bottleneck in port logistics, with demurrage costs of US$ 20,000 to US$ 25,000 per day,” said Teixeira. He added that the sector also faced high default rates among rural producers and was affected by changes in freight regulations, including fines for non-compliance with the National Land Transport Agency (ANTT) freight table.

Despite the difficulties, the sector’s outlook remains optimistic. “Fertilizer companies continue to invest heavily and open new hubs. So far, Brazil hasn’t faced any trade sanctions, it accepts fertilizers from all over the world, and it continues to expand grain production without deforestation — using degraded pasture areas instead,” Teixeira emphasized. For this reason, he believes the milestone of 50 million tonnes of fertilizers delivered in Brazil, initially projected for 2050, could be reached as early as 2028.

Source: Sindiadubos

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