In The Wall Street Journal, Jeff Stier, a Senior Fellow at the Heartland Institute, discusses the potential for a shock to the food supply. Stier warns that the fertilizer shortages created by the wars between Russia and Ukraine and the United States and Iran are being exacerbated by China, and that immediate action must be taken to prevent food shortages. He writes:

The White House hasn’t ignored the emerging crisis, but it must take urgent and concrete steps to stabilize domestic fertilizer supplies. Fertilizer price volatility threatens to undermine two pillars of the administration’s domestic priorities: controlling inflation, particularly food inflation; and eating more fruits, vegetables and whole grains.

Let me set the geopolitical chessboard. Russia is a leading fertilizer exporter, but its domestic needs have taken priority amid the war. Iran’s disruption of the Strait of Hormuz interferes with petroleum movement and fertilizer shipments. China, a major fertilizer user, has long been the world’s second-largest exporter of fertilizer—until recently. Over the past year, China has begun to pull back on exports to manipulate the market.

Chinese producers use American sulfur to manufacture phosphate fertilizers, which supply phosphorus—one of the three primary plant nutrients along with nitrogen and potassium. Backyard gardeners like me know it as the P in N-P-K.

Beginning late last year, China suspended exports of phosphate fertilizers. It then broadened its restrictions on additional fertilizer varieties in March and halted most sulfuric-acid exports beginning in May. Taken together, the suspensions and restrictions have likely affected as much as 40 million metric tons of Chinese fertilizer exports. Largely because of disruptions to petroleum production and sulfur shipments through the Strait of Hormuz, sulfur prices have increased substantially. China’s continued uptake of sulfur while banning fertilizer exports has contributed to a doubling of sulfur prices this year alone.

Read more here.