How geopolitics and decarbonisation are transforming fertiliser supply chains

Abstract

Speaker: Rainer Quitzow Fertilisers ensure 8 billion people are fed at any given day, their production causes greenhouse gas emissions approximately equivalent to those of the UK or France, and they have been subject to severe geopolitical shocks in recent years. Yet, fertilisers have not caught much attention in policy research. To fill this gap, this review maps the key challenges pertaining to the global fertiliser sector, conceptualizing them as a nexus problem in international political economy. Based on a review of key data and trends, it identifies four drivers altering the global political economy of fertilisers: a rapidly changing supply structure; the war in Ukraine and increasing securitisation; the growing role of the Global South, and the decarbonisation imperative. The increasing political salience and intertwined nature of these trends, the paper argues, warrants a distinct research agenda, which it sketches out along three major lines of inquiry.