“Good things happen to those who wait” goes the saying, but leading members of the potash sector are hoping it comes true as they hang on for the annual potash contract with Chinese buyers.
So far, things have been anything but. The absence this year of a yearly contract with China, the world’s largest potash buyer, has depressed demand and sales volumes for producers as the agreement acts as a price benchmark for the whole market.
Uralkali, the Russian potash producer, last month pointed to the absence of a supply contract with China as a factor behind the “cautiousness among customers who took a wait-and-see approach, delaying purchases”. Before that, Canada’s PotashCorp had blamed the “deferral of new contracts in China” for cautious buying in other regions.