SPECIAL APPEARANCE BY DR. FIDEL CASTRO RUZ, PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF CUBA, ON THE TELEVISED ROUNDTABLE, DETAILING RECENT EVENTS IN THE COUNTRY AND THE INCREASE OF AGGRESSIVE ACTIONS BY THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT AGAINST THE CUBAN PEOPLE. APRIL 25, 2003.
The miami herald Posted on Tue, Apr. 29, 2003 BY TIM JOHNSON tjohnson@herald.com
Secretary of State Colin Powell
WASHINGTON -In a series of grim reviews, senior Bush administration officials Monday warned of entrenched poverty and heavy debt levels in Latin America, and said many citizens feel that democracy has not brought better lives.
''We told them that democracy would work. . . . We made many promises,'' Secretary of State Colin Powell said.
''If we collectively do not deliver, then democracy has no meaning, the free-market system has no meaning,'' Powell told business leaders.
Powell joined Treasury Secretary John Snow and Otto Reich, the White House special envoy to the hemisphere, in telling business executives gathered for the annual Council of the Americas conference that discouraging setbacks overshadowed progress in many areas in the past year.
GENERAL OUTCRY
Their comments represented the first time in months that ranking officials of the Bush administration have focused on Latin America, amid a general outcry in the hemisphere that U.S. policy has neglected a region President Bush once called a fundamental U.S. priority.
At one point, Powell focused on Cuba, the only nondemocracy among the hemisphere's 35 nations. He called a 6-week-old crackdown by the Fidel Castro regime on leading dissidents a ''vain effort to stamp out the Cuban people's thirst for democracy'' and said U.S. policy toward Cuba is under review.
In Latin America, Powell and other officials said, poverty and corruption sap the aspirations of people.
A third of the people in Latin America ''are living on less than $2 a day, poorly fed, poorly housed and poorly educated,'' Reich said.
The ''trend lines overall may be positive'' in the region, Reich added, but ''entire regions are struggling'' with recession, crime, issues of injustice and other problems.
Snow, who recently returned from a trip to Brazil, Ecuador and Colombia, said he was struck by the ``huge problem of debt and the need to work down debt levels . . . in ways that don't tip the apple cart.''
BRAZIL'S SURPRISE
Amid their somewhat glum assessments of the region, Powell and Snow brightened in speaking of Brazil's president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, a former trade union leader who has surprised the business community since taking office Jan. 1.
Snow described Lula's ''great political skill'' in combining sound economic policy with strong social goals aimed at easing poverty. At a recent talk to Sao Paulo's chamber of commerce, Snow said he reminded the attendees of the fears they had of the populist Lula before he came to office and his subsequent success in revaluing the currency and calming financial markets.
The region as a whole, Snow said, ``needs growth. Latin America's growth rates are too low.''
He said slow economic growth, however, is a global matter, and that the nations of the hemisphere should redouble efforts to reach a Free Trade Area of the Americas by 2005, a goal set during the Clinton administration.
''We're anxious to get the negotiations moving. They are not moving at a rapid enough pace,'' Snow said.
`NO ILLUSIONS'
Reich, a Cuban-born former ambassador to Venezuela, noted that the Caribbean region has been hard hit by terrorism-related declines in tourism, and that Andean countries have ''suffered reverses'' in fighting narcotics, achieving economic growth and respecting the rule of law.
''We have no illusions about the challenges in the hemisphere today. There have been setbacks,'' Reich said.
Snow praised Ecuador's new president, Lucio Gutiérrez, but noted that his nation faces ``a thoroughly tough, tough, difficult environment [with] heavy debt overload problems.''
The White House's nominee to become assistant secretary of state for the Western Hemisphere, Roger Noriega, criticized Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez and Haitian leader Jean-Bertrand Aristide as two populist leaders who have ''willfully contributed to a polarized environment'' in their countries.
Attorney General John Ashcroft, responding to a question about Colombia, whose leader, Alvaro Uribe, meets with President Bush this week in Washington, said he believes governments should enter peace talks with outlaw groups involved in criminal activity ''with the highest level of caution -- maybe never.'' The remark brought applause. Uribe, a law-and-order leader, faces a demand by insurgents to enter a new round of negotiations.
REFORMS
Many leaders in the region have implemented reforms that have ameliorated the economic crises that once buffeted the hemisphere.
''The old demons are gone,'' Powell said. ``Inflation is largely tamed. Countries are increasingly open to foreign trade and investment.''
But Powell said average citizens still do not savor many of the benefits of democracy.
''People have sacrificed, and they want to see the results in their pocketbooks, in their pay packets and in their polling places,'' he said.
RELATED LINKS Powell condemns Cuba for 'human-rights situation'
Published by the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD)
Vol. 05 No. 185 Tuesday, 29 April 2003 CSD-11 HIGHLIGHTS: MONDAY, 28 APRIL 2003
The 11th session of the Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD-11) began on Monday at UN headquarters in New York. During the opening plenary, delegates heard introductory statements and adopted the agenda and organization of work. CSD-11 then began its high-level segment, starting with ministerial statements on the future modalities and work programme of the CSD. In the afternoon, a ministerial round table took place, with participation of leaders from Major Groups, on the issues of poverty eradication and changing unsustainable patterns of consumption and production.
OPENING OF THE SESSION
CSD-11 Chair Mohammed Valli Moosa, South Africa’s Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism, opened the session on Monday morning, informing delegates that their task was to decide on modalities and a future work programme for the CSD. Drawing attention to pledges made during the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD), he said problems such as global warming, hunger and disease must be tackled with the "same vigor recently displayed by some on the military front." In this regard, he underscored the multilateral approach as "the only real solution" for achieving sustainable development.
Nitin Desai, UN Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs, said participants must consider how to support concrete implementation of commitments made at the WSSD. Noting the presence at CSD-11 of many ministers and other high-level representatives of governments and civil society, he indicated that this meeting offers an ideal opportunity to establish a clear path for implementing previously agreed goals and targets on sustainable development.
UNEP Executive Director Klaus Töpfer said a key issue for UNEP was how to coordinate its work with that of other UN bodies, and drew attention to decisions taken at the UNEP Governing Council session in February 2003 to integrate WSSD outcomes in UNEP’s programme of work. Reflecting on CSD-11’s agenda, he said discussions on priority issues for the proposed two-year programme of work would be crucial.
Following the opening speeches, delegates adopted the agenda and approved the organization of work for the session (E/CN.17/ 2003/1).
HIGH-LEVEL SEGMENT
MINISTERIAL STATEMENTS: Following the opening of the session, participants heard statements by ministers and other high-level government officials on the future modalities and work programme of the CSD. GREECE, on behalf of the EU, called for the structure of the two-year work cycle proposed in the Secretary-General’s report (E/CN.17/2003/2) to be simplified. She urged a flexible work programme that would allow emerging issues to be addressed, and noted the EU’s preference for the third option presented in the Secretary-General’s report. This option proposes that CSD-11 selects one or two broad areas for each of the next four or five two-year cycles, while another area for the next cycle could be determined at future sessions. A number of delegations also favored this option, stating that it provides both predictability and flexibility. MOROCCO, on behalf of the G-77/CHINA, emphasized that the work programme should focus on implementation of the WSSD’s outcomes, and that the two-year cycle should be structured in a simple, effective and efficient manner, and avoid the proliferation of meetings. He said the first year should review progress in implementation of commitments to identify implementation constraints and obstacles. AUSTRIA stressed the need for the Bureau to ensure continuity in the multi-year cycle of work, and proposed several options to support this objective, including: electing Bureau members for the whole two-year cycle; rotating members; or enlarging the Bureau to 10 members.
On selection of issues for consideration by the Commission, many delegates cautioned against overloading the future work programme with too many themes. AUSTRALIA and CANADA suggested focusing on one theme over a two-year cycle. Many delegates supported selecting themes that lack a clear institutional home within the UN system. The RUSSIAN FEDERATION said the Commission might also consider themes not yet addressed in recent sessions. CROATIA, ITALY, and the EU supported water and energy as priorities for the future work programme. The NETHERLANDS also suggested focusing on Africa, while NORWAYsupported sustainable consumption and production as another important theme. PORTUGAL proposed prioritizing water and sanitation, and oceans. MAURITIUS, on behalf of AOSIS, stressed that the special focus accorded to SIDS in Agenda 21, the Barbados Programme of Action, and the WSSD must be reflected in the future work programme. INDIA suggested that the 22 sectors addressed in Agenda 21 be clustered into five two-year cycles, and, with INDONESIA, said the final cycle should review overall implementation.
Regarding the CSD’s future organizational arrangements, the CZECH REPUBLIC supported stronger involvement of UN regional commissions. The RUSSIAN FEDERATION stated that the regional review process should be uniform and have common criteria to ensure compatible and consistent outcomes. LITHUANIA said the work programme should prioritize subregional cooperation. The NETHERLANDS and FRANCE stressed the importance of national responsibility in achieving sustainable development. Several delegates also underscored the importance of continued high-level engagement and supported enhancing input from the scientific and educational communities to the CSD.
The REPUBLIC OF KOREA and the UK underscored the CSD’s role in monitoring partnerships and the implementation of the WSSD’s outcomes. NORWAY emphasized the importance of using existing reporting procedures, and CROATIA stressed the need for a unified reporting mechanism. The G-77/CHINA urged the CSD to define parameters that would guide and govern partnerships. AUSTRALIA stressed the importance of private sector investment, cautioned against politicizing CSD negotiations, and highlighted the CSD’s role in knowledge-sharing. ITALY supported public-private partnerships and stressed the role of the business community in sustainable development.
INTERACTIVE MINISTERIAL ROUND TABLE: On Monday afternoon, delegates began the interactive ministerial round table segment of the meeting. Chair Moosa introduced the segment, noting that it was intended to allow ministers and leaders of Major Groups to engage in a dialogue on key issues relating to implementation of the WSSD’s outcomes. He indicated that the issues to be discussed on Monday afternoon were those covered by the first two substantive chapters of the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation, namely poverty eradication and changing unsustainable patterns of sustainable consumption and production.
Poverty eradication: In the dialogue on poverty eradication, many participants highlighted theUN Millennium Declaration goals of halving, by 2015, the proportion of the world’s people earning less than one dollar a day, the proportion who suffer from hunger, and those without access to safe drinking water. Nitin Desai explained that meeting the poverty goal requires raising 100,000 people out of poverty every day from now until 2015. Stressing the need for a broad range of policies covering issues such as trade and natural resource management, he highlighted the CSD’s role in supporting policy coherence across these areas.
Many speakers discussed the linkages between poverty and water, with several delegates calling for increased donor aid and investment in the water sector. MALI noted that, while the UN Millennium Declaration goal on safe drinking water is important, a broader approach focused on protecting water resources is crucial. A spokesman for the Third World Water Forum noted ministerial agreement at the Forum to "redouble collective efforts" to meet the internationally-agreed water-related goals. SWITZERLAND said water should be one of the first topics discussed under the CSD’s future work programme, and NORWAY suggested developing a global programme of action on water. INDIGENOUS PEOPLE insisted on attaining water targets in a culturally-sensitive way, while SOUTH AFRICA and TRADE UNIONS expressed concerns about water privatization. AUSTRALIA linked access to water resources with good governance and suggested the use of a catchment approach in sharing water resources.
On the question of agricultural subsidies, FARMERS highlighted distortions within the private sector and the dominance of food sales by a small number of retail chains. SWEDEN referred to the EU’s difficulties in achieving ongoing reforms, and suggested considering agriculture early on in the CSD process.
On gender issues, GREECE and BRAZIL stressed the need to improve the status of women in sustainable development.
Changing unsustainable patterns of consumption and production: In the dialogue on changing unsustainable patterns of consumption and production, MOROCCO highlighted its plans to host an international expert meeting in June 2003 on a 10-year framework of programmes for sustainable production and consumption. SWEDEN noted that this issue has been on the sustainable development agenda for a long time, and stressed the need for implementation. VENEZUELA said that developed countries have a high degree of responsibility in changing their patterns of consumption and production, and stressed the importance of an ethical approach for achieving sustainable development. CANADA said patterns of consumption and production are universal, and are not a North-South issue. He stressed the need for full life-cycle product design, greater consumer information, and addressing the consumption attitudes of the affluent. JAPAN urged the international community to consider establishing a common recycling target, and to engage in international research on this matter. INDONESIA underscored the need for investment in cleaner production. YOUTH noted the lack of their involvement and called for an increased focus on education for sustainable consumption and production.
KENYA stressed the need to address patterns of consumption and production in poverty reduction strategies, while NGOs suggested that these patterns be addressed in national sustainable development strategies, and INDONESIA proposed they be included in business plans. Highlighting the involvement of all Major Groups, SWEDEN underscored the role of women and the business community. FINLAND suggested that sustainable consumption and production should be considered in the first cycle of the CSD work programme.
Several speakers noted the importance of energy, with the NETHERLANDS stating that it should be considered in the work programme. BRAZIL highlighted its proposal for a global initiative for 10% renewable energy by 2010. NORWAY stressed the need for renewable energy targets and environmental considerations in the use of hydroelectricity. PAKISTAN underscored the need to increase the use of renewable energy and energy efficiency measures.
IRELAND stressed the need for adequate resources and financing, and called on developed countries to meet their ODA commitments. INDIGENOUS PEOPLE and the SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNOLOGICAL COMMUNITY addressed the recovery and application of traditional knowledge and practices. SENEGAL and UNEP emphasized the importance of technology transfer. SWITZERLAND and TRADE UNIONS called for the ratification and implementation of the POPs and PIC Conventions.
IN THE CORRIDORS
On a well-attended opening day, delegates started grappling with the question of the exact role the "new" CSD should play. The first ministerial round table, which in the words of one delegate was managed with an "iron fist" by the Chair, generally received a positive response. Though some felt the discussion was somewhat jumbled, they also acknowledged that it was remarkably free of rhetoric and point-scoring, and had generated a variety of useful ideas.
Speculating on the controversial subjects likely to crop up over the next two weeks, participants singled out several items, including the number of themes to be addressed at future sessions, the prospect of proliferating meetings in each work cycle, the question of how far ahead to set the work programme, the issue of regional implementation forums, and new and additional financial resources and technology transfer. Some observers also expressed disappointment at the small number of non-environment ministers attending this session, and were questioning how this could be resolved.
THINGS TO LOOK FOR TODAY
INFORMAL MINISTERIAL MEETING: An informal meeting, where ministers will exchange views with the Chair, is taking place in Conference Room 6 from 8:30-10:00 am.
MINISTERIAL STATEMENTS: Delegates will continue to hear statements by ministers and other high-level representatives on "Visions for the Future CSD" from 10:00-11:30 am in Conference Room 4.
REGIONAL IMPLEMENTATION FORUMS: Ministers and high-level officials will convene from 11:30 am - 1:00 pm to discuss initial steps taken in the ECE and ECLAC regions to implement the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation. The Forums will take place in Conference Rooms 1 and 4. Please check the Journal for venues.
MINISTERIAL ROUND TABLE: Ministerial round table discussions will take place in Conference Room 1 from 3:00-6:00 pm on "Protecting and managing the natural resource base of economic and social development" and on "Health and sustainable development."
This issue of the Earth Negotiations Bulletin © enb@iisd.org is written and edited by Prisna Nuengsigkapian prisna@iisd.org, Richard Sherman richard@iisd.org, Chris Spence chris@iisd.org and Andrey Vavilov, Ph.D. andrey@iisd.org. The Digital Editors are Leila Mead leila@iisd.org and Leslie Paas leslie@iisd.org. The Editor is Pamela S. Chasek, Ph.D. pam@iisd.org and the Director of IISD Reporting Services is Langston James "Kimo" Goree VI kimo@iisd.org. The Sustaining Donors of the Bulletin are the US Department of State Bureau of Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs, The Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Government of Canada (through CIDA, DFAIT and Environment Canada), the Swiss Agency for Environment, Forests and Landscape (SAEFL), the United Kingdom (through the Department for International Development - DFID and Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs - DEFRA), the European Commission (DG-ENV), the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the Government of Germany (through the German Federal Ministry of Environment - BMU, and the German Federal Ministry of Development Cooperation - BMZ). General Support for the Bulletin during 2003 is provided by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the Government of Australia, the Ministry of Environment and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Sweden, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade of New Zealand, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Norway, Swan International, the Japanese Ministry of Environment (through the Institute for Global Environmental Strategies - IGES), the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (through the Global Industrial and Social Progress Research Institute - GISPRI), and the Ministry for Environment of Iceland. The opinions expressed in the Earth Negotiations Bulletin are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of IISD or other donors. Excerpts from the Earth Negotiations Bulletin may be used in non-commercial publications with appropriate academic citation. For information on the Bulletin, including requests to provide reporting services, contact the Director of IISD Reporting Services at kimo@iisd.org, +1-212-644-0217 or 212 East 47th St. #21F, New York, NY 10017, USA.
This page was uploaded on 04.29.2003
Oslo |<a href=www.gulf-news.com>Gulf News-Reuters | 29-04-2003
Norwegian Statoil reckons it will reach its oil and gas output goals for 2007 but is worried about fading prospects after that unless it gets access to new exploration areas, its chief executive said yesterday.
Olav Fjell also said that gas activities were playing an increasingly important role, estimating gas would replace oil as its key business within 20 years.
"We are in a phase that we can call the gas age," Fjell said on the sidelines of a first-quarter result presentation. "I think gas will be more important than oil for all of us within a 20-year period."
Statoil, Norway's biggest oil and gas producer and the biggest Nordic firm by turnover, said first-quarter profits were boosted by firm oil production and prices, and stuck to a 2004 output goal of 1.12 million barrels of oil equivalent per day (boed).
It said January to March pre-tax profits rose 17 per cent year-on-year to 12.58 billion Norwegian crowns ($1.77 billion). The company reaffirmed its key performance and production targets for 2004.
But the profit lagged analysts' forecasts of 13.08 billion as a strong Norwegian currency undermined dollar-denominated earnings and gas prices fell.
It targeted production of 1.06 million boed this year. It did not spell out longer-term output targets but Fjell said the group was on track to reach an earlier stated goal of producing 1.26 million boed in 2007.
"Today, we are producing roughly one million barrels (oil equivalent) a day. I think that will last until 2007," Fjell said. "We will reach the goals that we have communicated."
But he said he feared authorities' reluctance to open northern areas of the Norwegian continental shelf for exploration could dampen future production prospects for Statoil and its peers, and damage Norway's future as an energy nation.
Norway, pumping about three million barrels of oil per day, is the world's third-biggest oil exporter after Saudi Arabia and Russia, and a major gas supplier to Europe.
"How long we will manage to keep current output levels will depend on whether we get access to new exploration areas so that we can put new areas in production. If we don't get that, we'll see lower production volumes in the future," Fjell said.
"When I'm worried about exploration on the Norwegian shelf, I'm talking about production volumes further out in time, after 2007," Fjell said.
He expressed high hopes for Norway's 18th offshore licensing round and for authorities' environmental impact study of possible future oil activities in the Arctic Barents Sea, due to be completed in autumn this year.
Statoil's giant Snoehvit liquefied natural gas (LNG) project, due to come onstream in 2006, is so far the only active energy development on the Norwegian side of the Barents Sea.
The project has spurred sharp environmental protest and political resistance for further exploration in the area, which is believed to contain huge gas reserves which oil firms hope can compensate for maturing North Sea fields further south.
Fjell said international operations would gradually make up a bigger share of overall oil and gas output, with the biggest focus on Iran, Venezuela, Brazil and Azerbaijan.
"On a longer-term basis, we hope to be able to do something in Russia," he added. "We have worked mostly with Lukoil, but we are also talking to others. But that's far ahead in time."
<a href=www.stltoday.com>Saint Louis Post-Dispatch By Repps Hudson Post-Dispatch updated: 04/28/2003 11:16 PM
Farmers planting corn this spring are getting a refresher course in the law of supply and demand.
The price of natural gas, the main ingredient in production of nitrogen fertilizers, is nearly double what it was a year ago.
That's because winter was cold - again - and the amount of gas in storage is down drastically.
As for the effect on food prices for consumers, Jim Milleville doesn't see any. He's general manager of St. Clair Service Co., a farm cooperative in Belleville with about 1,000 members. "The cost of processing food is so much more than the commodity that it shouldn't make any difference."
Farmers will have to absorb the fertilizer cost increase.
Mike Schulte, a Belleville-area farmer who's planting 300 acres of corn this spring, is one of the lucky ones. He bought nitrogen fertilizer at $295 a ton last fall, before natural-gas prices hit about $9.50 a million cubic feet in late February. "Now (the fertilizer's) up to about $400 to $430 a ton," he said.
Another lucky - or far-sighted - farmer is Fred Yoder of Plain City, Ohio, president of the National Corn Growers Association. He paid $110 a ton last fall for anhydrous ammonia for his 450 acres of corn. Today that same nitrogen fertilizer would cost 55 percent more.
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"They may be contemplating cutting back on their acreage," he said, "or planting and then waiting until the corn's 6 to 12 inches high, then side-dressing it."
That would mean an application of anhydrous ammonia while the plants are young. It would be an additional expense in tractor fuel and time, but a drop in fertilizer prices could compensate for that cost, Yoder said.
Two years ago, after the worst natural-gas price spike anyone can remember, farmers also paid extraordinarily high prices for nitrogen fertilizers.
Natural gas provides the energy and the hydrogen to produce nitrogen fertilizers from ammonia. Natural gas accounts for 70 percent to 80 percent of the cost of such fertilizers, said Peter Scharf, associate professor of agronomy at the University of Missouri at Columbia.
He has written a paper urging farmers to use caution before deciding to switch to soybeans from corn because of the high cost of the fertilizer corn needs. For example, beans don't require nitrogen fertilizers.
Corn and soybeans are the two major crops most farmers in this area raise. They usually rotate the crops to protect soil conditions.
Scharf noted that when farmers plant beans on the same field a second year, the yield typically will be 5 percent to 8 percent lower than if they follow corn-bean rotation.
If farmers go with beans again instead, they could run into another law of supply and demand.
Fertilizing with nitrogen this spring may cost farmers $8 to $20 more an acre, but they still would be betting that their corn yield will make enough to turn a small profit, Scharf said.
Milleville estimated that farmers are paying up to $13.50 an acre more than they did last spring for fertilizer for corn.
Assuming corn sells for $2.50 a bushel this fall, Milleville said, farmers would have to raise an additional five bushels an acre to make up the cost.
However, if they switch to beans, Milleville noted, beans might glut the market, which could drive down the price.
At the same time, a smaller amount of corn planted this spring would mean a smaller harvest - and possibly higher prices. That would benefit corn growers.
Yoder said he expects corn production to drop 10 percent to 15 percent nationwide this year as more farmers switch to soybeans or grain sorghum, also known as milo, to save money.
Milo, which grows in drier conditions, is primarily a cattle feed.
Farmers in the South, who use natural gas to run irrigation pumps, may be thinking about switching to milo this year, because natural gas is too expensive to make irrigation cost-effective, Yoder said.
The higher price of natural gas will boost the cost of producing corn by about $2 billion nationwide, he said.
Much also depends upon things farmers cannot control: weather, overseas production and markets and other factors, such as military conflicts or political instability.
Scharf recommends that farmers scale back application of nitrogen fertilizers this spring by 10 to 20 pounds an acre, "thus saving about $3 to $6 an acre."
The science of agronomy hasn't developed to the point that it can determine exactly how much nitrogen is needed on a particular field, he said. "We find there's a tremendous amount of variability in soil productivity, field to field - even within a field."
The variables include soil types, humus, moisture content and other factors that can differ within just a few feet.
Applying fertilizer is a little like carpet bombing. Agronomy hasn't evolved to the point that fertilizer can be applied like "smart bombs" to boost productivity where it's needed while leaving the rest of the field alone.
Scharf and other observers see more uncertainty down the road, much of it related to fluctuations in natural-gas prices and the movement offshore of fertilizer production.
China is the largest producer of nitrogen fertilizers, followed by areas such as Eastern Europe, Trinidad and Tobago, Saudi Arabia and Venezuela, where the market price of natural gas is consistently lower than in the United States, Scharf said.
Two years ago, the market price of natural gas was much higher than what fertilizer producers had contracted for. As a result, those producers sold their gas to the market and didn't make fertilizer, Scharf said. That cut down on fertilizer supplies and helped push up the price.
The same trend seems to be happening again, Scharf said.
Furthermore, natural gas in underground storage in early April was 623 billion cubic feet, 883 billion cubic feet less than a year ago, according to the Energy Information Administration. This supply is 598 billion cubic feet - 49 percent - below the five-year national average of 1,221 billion cubic feet. That was a record low level for the last nine years, the Energy Information Administration said.
Reporter Repps Hudson: E-mail: rhudson@post-dispatch.com Phone: 314-340-8208