A Strait Too Narrow: How Fertiliser Disruption Is Unravelling Global Food Security

As conflict unfolds in the Middle East, markets and consumers remain fixated on the Strait of Hormuz. Headlines focus on disrupted shipping lanes, supply chain uncertainty and rising petrol prices. But far less attention has been paid to how this crisis reaches beyond the gas pump and sits on the shelves of our local grocery stores.  

Fertiliser Shock to Revealing Systemic Food Risks  

The UN World Food Programme warns that prolonged disruption of the Strait of Hormuz could push up to 45 million people more into food insecurity. If the conflict continues, WFP forecasts a 21% increase in food-insecure people in West and Central Africa and a 24% increase in food-insecure people in Asia.  

According to a report by The Global Alliance for the Future of Food, food systems account for at least 15% of global fossil fuel use annually. What might initially appear as an energy or transport crisis will create a systemic shock to the global food system. 

The Middle East plays a major role in global fertiliser production, and around one-third of fertiliser traded worldwide is shipped via the Strait of Hormuz. 

The near closure of the Strait due to the conflict has forced fertiliser plants in the region to halt or cut output. This impacts Northern Hemisphere farmers who are currently preparing for spring planting. These delays will certainly have an impact on yields. Disruption in yields leads to higher prices, tighter supply, and uneven access, which will hit smaller farms and consumers alike. 

Beyond Fertilizer: A Food Chain Addicted to Fossil Fuels

With so much instability rooted in our food system, why have we doubled down on fossil fuels? Synthetic nitrogen fertilizers and pesticides are derived almost exclusively from fossil fuels and constitute one-third of our global use of petrochemicals. 

 But what about the convenience of nitrogen fertilizer? This is a type of short-term logic that creates long-term issues. Some estimates say half of all nitrogen fertilizers applied to soil is lost, while the UNEP says it is closer to 80%, polluting soil, rivers and lakes, creating aquatic dead zones and destroying biodiversity and human health.  

When nitrogen fertilizers are emitted into the air, they accelerate climate change, comprising 60% of anthropogenic nitrous oxide (N₂O) emissions. This is nearly 300 times more climate potent than CO₂. 

This issue extends beyond fertilizer. Fossil fuels have snuck into every part of the food chain. Beyond the farm, food processing, manufacturing, packaging, transport and retail distribution now accounts for 42% of total fossil fuel consumption in food systems.

Highly processed foods are made up from commodity crops like corn that rely on nitrogen based fertilized. Then the corn is harvested with tractors and machines also powered by oil. Next, the crops need energy-intensive industrial processing.

Diets are shifting toward more processed foods, which require two to ten times more energy to produce than whole foods, and now account for up to 60% of calorie intake in many high-income countries.

The middle of the chain energy demand is set to increase globally, only further exposing us to fluctuations in fossil fuel prices. 

Turning Towards More Ecological Ways of Farming

In a recent article by Euronews, some farmers in Europe are starting to decrease their reliance on nitrogen fertiliser, and thereby reduce their vulnerability to fertiliser shocks by relying on natural soil fertility, nitrogen fixing crops, compost, manure and closed nutrient cycles.  

Case studies from farms in Finland, Greece, and Switzerland the European Alliance for Regenerative Agriculture (EARA), further corroborate these findings. Farmers who used minimum or no tillage, cover cropping, diverse rotations, nitrogen fixing plants, composting and agroforestry often achieved close to yield parity with neighboring farms, while using 61% less synthetic nitrogen fertiliser. These farms also achieved over 25% higher photosynthesis, 24% higher soil cover, indicating healthier soil, better water retention and greater resilience to extreme weather. 

Lessons Learned from the 2022 Ukraine Crisis

After price shocks in 2022 from the war in Ukraine, why have we not moved faster to ensure our collective resilience, not just in the energy sector, but also through food system transformation?  The EU’s Farm to Fork strategy’s aims to reduce nutrient losses from fertilizers by at least 50% by 2030, which was expected to result in a minimum 20% reduction in overall fertilizer use. Why has this not been taken more seriously? 

The fertiliser shock brought on by geopolitical complications in the Strait of Hormuz is landing at a particularly sensitive moment for European policymaking.  

Agriculture sector representatives convened in Brussels earlier this month to discuss the dire consequences of the conflict on farmers and prices. The European Commission is preparing its EU Fertiliser Action Plan in April.  

At the same time, the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) requires EU importers to pay a carbon price on selected goods imported from outside the EU, based on the greenhouse gas emissions generated during their production. Farmers in Poland, Ireland, Italy or Spain have escalated demands to suspend the CBAM on account of their mounting input costs.  

Recent statements by Agriculture and Food Commissioner Christophe Hansen have raised concerns that environmental safeguards could once again become the adjustment variable in times of crisis. His suggestion that fertiliser price spikes and the conflict in Iran might justify “revisiting” the Nitrates Directive and the Water Framework Directive echoes the response to previous shocks. 

This story is all too familiar. A shock reveals systemic weaknesses and most are tempted to lock into another cycle of short-term fixes rather than address the structural drivers of vulnerability. 

Why This Crisis Could Be a Turning Point

Geopolitical instability isn’t the only risk. Many observers recognise the increasing likelihood of a strong El Niño as a natural disaster that can also destabilise our food systems. El Niño events disrupt global weather patterns, increasing the probability of droughts, heatwaves and floods across multiple key agricultural regions at the same time. For farmers, this means reduced yields, tighter planting windows and higher uncertainty often months before the impacts are fully visible in markets. 

This crisis lays bare a central reality; Europe’s structural dependence on imported fossil fuels and their derivatives like fertilizers poses significant risks to our economies, our security and the resilience of our food system. Extreme weather, heat stress, droughts and floods are already making food production more difficult, often simultaneously across multiple regions. What experts and farmers alike warn about is not a single crisis, but the cumulative effect. 

We are caught in a feedback loop: excessive use of fossil fuels through e.g. synthetic fertilisers accelerates climate change; climate change undermines agricultural productivity; and when these exact fertiliser supplies are disrupted, the system has no buffer left. 

Europe’s reliance on imported gas, synthetic fertilisers and globalised supply chains leaves its food system exposed to exactly the kinds of geopolitical and climate related shocks that are becoming more frequent. 

But in every crisis there is also an opportunity. Policymakers should avoid repeating the mistakes made after the 2022 Ukraine shock, when short-term thinking prevailed and deeper transformation stalled. Instead, this crisis could catalyse a shift toward more sustainable, diversified and climate-resilient agricultural systems. Already on the energy side, we are seeing that the Commission is responding to the crisis by setting out a structural shift away from imported fossil fuels and in favour of renewables and electrification. A similar shift on the extensive use of fossil fuels, especially fertilizers must follow.  

The choices we make in the coming months will determine whether this moment becomes another episode of policy backsliding, or the start of a food system fitted for the future.