Forecasting fertilizer demand of China in 2010 using CBEM model

The supply and demand of fertilizer in the world has fluctuated frequently in recent years, which requires more reliable forecast of fertilizer demand for market development. In collaboration with IFA, a new method of crop based- expert’s model （CBEM） has been developed for China. Based on this model, the trend of fertilizer demand before 2010 was forecasted. The results showed that fertilizer demand of China would increase continuously in the next five years. Although most of the crops of China have been treated with chemical fertilizers at large scale and with great quantity, a lot of crops have great room to use more fertilizers. More than half of farmers rarely use phosphate fertilizer on maize, soybean and potato. Nearly 70% farmers rarely use potash fertilizer on maize, soybean, oilseeds, cotton, potato and tea. Compared with nitrogen and phosphate, the application rate of potash fertilizer was low in most crop systems of China. Meanwhile, the huge and growing population, more and more food demand especially animal food and the developing economy will strongly encourage the development of cash crops, such as vegetables and fruit trees, which require more fertilizers compared with other crops. The developing situation of food security and bio-fuel would require planting more maize, soybean and oilseeds, which would tighten the international supply of these products and then result in booming development of them in some countries, such as China. Integrated analysis of planting area, fertilized area and application rate of 12 cropping systems of China indicated that the total demand of fertilizer would reach 49.00 to 53.61 million tons in 2010. Compared with that in 2005, the fertilizer demand would increase by 1.78 million tons at least, and would increase by 6.38 million tons at maximum. The growth rate of N, P2O5 and K2O would be 3.6%–7.5%，2.4%–14.1% and 6.5%–38.7%, respectively, from 2005 to 2010. The main consumers of increased demand of fertilizer would be vegetables, fruit trees, and maize. They shared 21%–29%, 17%–26% and 17%–21% of the total 1.78–6.38 million tons of increased demand from 2005 to 2010, respectively.