Although fertilizer plants in the country are able to meet domestic demand for urea fertilizer, Vietnam imported 652,000 tons of urea last year, three times higher than in 2014.

Nguyen Hac Thuy, vice chairman and general secretary of the Vietnam Fertilizer Association, said a number of local firms imported urea in 2015 for re-export, instead of selling it on the home market.

According to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, Vietnam spent US$1.43 billion importing 4.56 million tons of fertilizer products last year, up 15% and 20% against 2014 respectively. Of them, urea and SA fertilizer imports rose sharply.

Urea imports soared by three times while SA fertilizer imports climbed 13% to 1.05 million tons, the ministry said. Fertilizer shipments from China accounted for nearly 47% of the total fertilizer import bill, and the remainder was from Indonesia, Malaysia, South Korea and Belgium.

According to the Ministry of Finance’s Price Management Department, Vietnam needed around 10.83 million tons of fertilizer including 2.1 million tons of urea last year. Locally-produced fertilizer output totaled 8.3 million tons with urea fertilizer making up 2.27 million tons, so fertilizer imports for domestic needs should be around 2.53 million tons.

Therefore, the fertilizer volume imported for re-export should have accounted for more than two million tons of the 4.56 million tons imported in 2015 in accordance with what Hac explained.

However, data of the General Department of Customs showed fertilizer exports had neared 647,500 million tons worth roughly US$233 million as of November 15.