FERTILIZER INDEX REACHES PEAK

A gauge of North American fertilizer prices soared to a record high, driving up costs for farmers and threatening to worsen food inflation. The Green Markets North America Fertilizer Price Index rose 7.9 per cent to US$996.32 per short ton, soaring past its 2008 peak to set a new benchmark for the index that began in January 2002. The fertilizer market has been hit hard this year due to extreme weather, plant shutdowns, sanctions and rising energy costs in Europe and China, pushing prices past levels that traders and farmers hadn't seen since the global financial crisis. In Canada, the world's largest canola exporter and a major wheat producer, farmers faced the biggest fertilizer price hike since 2015 in this year's second quarter, according to Statistics Canada.