DEARER FERTILISER FORECAST

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30895, 30 October 1965, Page 10

DEARER FERTILISER FORECAST

Further rises in the New Zealand price of phosphatic fertilisers seemed inevitable in the future as supplies had to be obtained from further afield, Dr. B. W. Doak, senior fertiliser research officer to the British Phosphate Commission in Australia, said in Auckland recently.

Dr. Doak, who has been in New Zealand to inspect trials with Christmas Island phosphate, said fertiliser demand in Australia and New Zealand had increased 17 per cent a year over the last two years compared with an annual increase of 6 to 7 per cent previously. He said the sources of supply controlled by the British Phosphate Commission— Nauru and Ocean Islands in the Pacific and Christmas Island in the Indian Ocean—could not continue to be rained at an ever increasing rate and this meant greater use of phosphate from elsewhere.

“Although deposits on Christmas Island are greater than we thought previously,” said Dr. Doak, “New Zealand and Australia will still have to buy phosphate from other world sources where the price

is right and the grade is right. “There is no world shortage of phosphate but the price elsewhere is likely to be higher than that for phosphate from our own com-mission-controlled islands.” Dr. Doak said that for years New Zealand and Australia had used the best and cheapest phosphate in the world but the Pacific deposits were not inexhaustible and now the Nauru Islanders were demanding higher royalties. The Pacific sources were estimated to last another 25 to 30 years but, whatever happened, New Zealand and Australia would have to get phosphate from sources other than those controlled by the British Phosphate Commission. I South Africa was trying to [ find markets for phosphate | from an enormous reserve in

the Transvaal but here the! cost would be high because] the phosphate was of volcanic origin and special plant was necessary to grind the hard rock. A new field was about to be opened in Peru but the deposits were of too low a grade to make superphosphate to the standard of quality of that at present used in New Zealand. North Africa had a number ;of sources too but here i again the freight costs were I high. Florida Dr. Doak said more phosphate was being mined in Florida and recent developments there would give New Zealand an additional chance of obtaining fertiliser if she wanted it and could obtain it at the right price. A recent message from overseas says that the International Minerals and Chemical Corporation will expand its phosphate rock production by 33 per cent with the construction of a big new plant near Bartow, Florida. The capacity of the plant, which will be completed in September next year, will be more than two million tons of phosphate a year. The corporation’s production capacity in Florida will then be I eight million tons a year or I about 15 per cent of total I world output.