Without fertilizer, a crucial agricultural commodity, half the world's population would not be here today. It has allowed us to mass-produce food by boosting the amount of nitrogen in the ground and increasing yields without the need for increasing productive land.
As with many commercial agricultural commodities, international trade of it has steadily increased as population growth has created needs.
Each of these support plant growth in different ways.
Nitrogen supports leaf growth, Potassium helps with photosynthesis, nutrient absorption and root forming, and it also protects from disease. Phosphorus improves fruits and flowering and helps nitrogen absorption.
The different fertilizers are used in different stages of the plant's life cycle with nitrogen ins the middle and phosphorous throughout.
The global nitrogenous fertilizer market reached USD 57.2 billion in 2021 and is projected to grow at 5.7%, spurred mainly by commercial agriculture's increasing popularity worldwide. Agriculture has been increasingly demanding nitrogenous fertilizers to provide the right nutrition for various food crops and improve their yield.
Just shy of 120 million metric tons of nitrogen fertilizer were consumed globally in 2018, which amounts to around 60% of the total combined amount of fertilizer used that year (200 million metric tons). Phosphorus is the second most popular nutrient, and potassium holds third place.
Most European and North American countries have put forth suitable regulations to limit the use of synthetic chemicals for crop protection--creating a promising business environment for biofertilizers.
The primary forces driving the market for biofertilizers are increased organic farming, demand for improved soil organic matter, and supportive regulatory structures. Also, with the rise of integrated pest management programs that advocate using biofertilizers, it's anticipated that there will be greater use of biofertilizers in agriculture.
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