The Minister of Agriculture, Tereza Cristina, is traveling this weekend to Ottawa, the capital of Canada, for meetings with the Canadian Minister of Agriculture and the North American country’s fertilizer exporters.
The Minister’s trip will take place from March 12 to 15, as reported by the Official Gazette (DOU) on Tuesday (8).
The war in Ukraine revealed Brazil’s dependence on imported fertilizers. Of the 40.6 million tonnes of fertilizer consumed by national agriculture, 81% come from abroad, especially from Russia.
On the other hand, as shown in TIMEa Petrobras recently sold a fertilizer plant to a Russian company. With the sanctions against Russia for the invasion of Ukraine, this factory should no longer operate.
Last week, Tereza Cristina said that potassium is the product of most concern to the Brazilian government. Faced with the impending shortage of fertilizer, she said she would negotiate with countries like Canada to guarantee the purchase of the product, essential for rural producers.
“Our biggest bottleneck in Brazil is potassium. We import more than 90% of what we consume. This is the product that concerns us the most and that is why, anticipating this, we have articulated with other producing countries, such as Canada,” she said in an interview with CNN Brasil last week. .
TIME is now in Brasilia. Access special Federal Capital coverage to follow the news from the three powers.
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