The government decided to take advantage of all possible tools that will guarantee agricultural producers a smooth passage of the spring sowing season. Chemical companies, which have already introduced quotas for the export of fertilizers, must fix the prices for supplies to the domestic market at the average level in May-July 2021, as well as sign supply agreements with at least 16 regions. At the same time, farmers are still unhappy and consider the basis for calculating new prices to be overstated.
Fertilizer producers will freeze the cost of their products on the domestic market until the end of May at the level of average values in May-July 2021. This issue was discussed at a conference call with the regions at the Ministry of Agriculture on November 19, Kommersant sources familiar with its course told Kommersant.
In addition, the Ministry of Industry and Trade and the Ministry of Agriculture by the end of November intend to approve a supply plan broken down by months from December 2021 to the end of 2022 for each company, region and type of fertilizer.
At the same time, 16 regions with the highest consumption of fertilizers will conclude agreements with producers, in which obligations on the volume of supplies and purchases will be fixed. The rest of the regions can sign a similar document if they deem it necessary to have such a control instrument. It is also planned to write down a specific list of distributors in the appendix to the agreements.
The general director of PhosAgro and the head of the Russian Association of Fertilizers Producers, Andrey Guryev, confirmed that producers are ready to extend the price fixing regime for the domestic market until the end of May 2022.
At the beginning of November, the government has already introduced a restriction on the export of fertilizers in the form of a quota for six months – from December 1, 2021 to the end of May 2022.
“The question is still whether farmers are ready to buy fertilizers at the price of the summer of 2021. A drought took place in many regions, and there was no revenue in the industry,” says Mikhail Glushkov, director of the National Union of Fruit and Vegetable Producers. In his opinion, it is important that the plans for the purchase of fertilizers by the regions in 2022 are up-to-date, and it is also necessary to clarify what to do for those companies who, for some reason, did not fall into the needs declared by the regions.
