March 22, 2013
Rabobank: Urea capacity expansion will burst the urea bubble
Unprecedented acceleration in capacity expansion by key urea importers (US, Brazil and India) and low-cost urea producers in the Middle East and Africa (MEA) will drive structural changes in the global urea market, which is set to enter an era of oversupply post 2015, according to Rabobank.
This capacity expansion is expected to improve the self-sufficiency of the top three importers and ensure that supply growth significantly outpaces demand growth, shifting the market into a buyers'' market towards 2020. The competition among traditional exporters in the MEA, China and the FSU will intensify, resulting in price pressure and capacity rationalisation in high-cost regions.
"Attractive returns in urea production have resulted in a spurt in capacity expansion projects since 2007" Rakhi Sehrawat, Rabobank analyst commented. "The expansion is driven mainly by the exploitation of shale gas in the United States (US), new gas fields in Brazil, political incentives in India, and low-cost natural gas in MEA. Over 65 new projects have been announced that will expand global urea capacity by 30% between now and 2020. This rush of activity on the supply side will have a strong influence on the urea demand/supply picture in the coming five to 10 years".
The urea production boom will impact players across its value chain, especially high-cost producers and traders. As the import reliance of the main urea destination markets declines and low-cost export-oriented capacity grows, competition among the traditional players/exporters will intensify, resulting in price pressure and capacity rationalisation in high-cost regions. In this market, strategic routes of the urea value chain partners (i.e. producers and traders) would need to change to adapt to this new reality in the urea industry.
For high-cost producers it means they would need to strengthen their market position through cross-industry partnerships and downstream integration closer to farmers. The winners will be those who can achieve low costs of production and/or are placed close to a demand market enabling them to quickly respond to demand dynamics by altering production cycles. Market intelligence and access to growers will be key success factors in this case.
Lower volumes destined for key urea importers and a diminished role of high-cost exporters in the oversupplied market will have implications for traders. They will need to make the important decision of whether to expand their overall role in the supply chain through upstream or downstream integration or by maintaining focus on trading fertilisers but increasing sourcing of urea from the emerging competitive capacities.
Source: Rabobank