Moroccan Phosphate Trade Battle

OMAHA (DTN) -- The U.S. Commerce Department is unwilling to give up when it comes to placing higher import duties on phosphorus fertilizer from Morocco.

The National Corn Growers Association (NCGA) said Friday its leaders are again worried about the availability and price of inputs after the Commerce Department announced plans to raise tariffs on phosphorous fertilizers imported from Morocco from 2.12% to 14.21%.

The Commerce decision comes after department officials last November agreed to conduct a review on countervailing duties against Moroccan phosphate products and lowered the import duties from 19.975 down to 2.12%.

Commerce's actions come after the domestic fertilizer company Mosaic requested action from the agency in 2023 over an import dispute with another multinational company, NCGA said.

"The price of corn has dropped, and input costs are already high, so the Commerce Department's decision is the last thing farmers need," said Harold Wolle, a Minnesota farmer and NCGA president. "If fertilizers continue to go up in price and are hard to secure, farmers will only have Mosaic and the Commerce Department to thank."

As DTN Fertilizer Trends has tracked, DAP prices average $781 a ton, the highest prices since last July. MAP prices are $830 a ton, the highest since June of last year.

The proposed rate would be the final retroactive tariff for 2022 imports and serve as the new provisional rate required to be deposited with U.S. Customs for imports from November 2024 and onward until the conclusion of the next administrative review, if requested.

NCGA has spent the last two years sounding alarms over the issue and lobbying to lower the tariffs or eliminate them, the group noted.

See, "DTN Fertilizer Trends" for May 1 https://www.dtnpf.com/…

Also see, "Moroccan Phosphate Duties Lowered,"

https://www.dtnpf.com/…

Chris Clayton can be reached at Chris.Clayton@dtn.com

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