Ballance general manager of sales Jason Minkhorst says there had been extreme volatility in the price of nutrients over the past 12 months.
Ballance Agri Nutrients has lowered urea prices after it says it incorrectly read international market signals when it lifted fertiliser prices late last month.
SustaiN and urea have decreased $250 a tonne to $1239, DAP will be decreasing by $155/t to $1370 and SOA will be decreasing by $30/t to $712.
Balance general manager of sales Jason Minkhorst said there had been extreme volatility in the price of nutrients over the past 12 months driven by high global demand and a constrained supply of product.
“Two weeks ago our global demand and supply signals were suggesting that prices were going to continue to strengthen. There was strong demand out of both India and China that was signifying future prices would continue to be driven up in the medium-term,” Minkhorst said.
“We looked to benchmark our pricing with Australia and Europe to validate our pricing. At the time, this validated the increasing price trend that we saw as New Zealand pricing was at a relative discount.
“The last two weeks indicate that we have read these signals wrong, especially for nitrogen-based products. Due to our desire to remain competitive domestically, and global markets showing some immediate softening, we have reviewed our prices downwards.”
