The Biggest Fertilizer Companies

Published September 30, 2026 · Updated October 5, 2026 · 4 min read

Crops need three main nutrients: nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. Each comes from a different raw material - nitrogen fertilizers such as urea are made from natural gas, phosphate fertilizers such as DAP from mined phosphate rock, and potash from underground salt deposits. These were the ten largest fertilizer companies by revenue in 2025:

Group revenue in 2025. OCP, PhosAgro, Yuntianhua and K+S converted from dirhams, roubles, yuan and euros at average exchange rates ("c."). Nutrien's figure includes its large farm retail business. Not listed: Saudi Arabia's Ma'aden, whose revenue also includes aluminium and gold, and EuroChem, Uralkali, Belaruskali and the US private company Koch, which publish no comparable figures. Sources: company annual results.

The ten companies in brief

Nutrien

Nutrien was formed in 2018 from the merger of the Canadian companies PotashCorp and Agrium, is based in Saskatoon and listed in Toronto and New York. It mines potash in Saskatchewan, makes nitrogen and phosphate fertilizers and runs more than 2,000 farm retail outlets in North and South America and Australia.

Yara

Yara goes back to Norsk Hydro, founded in 1905 to make nitrogen fertilizer with hydroelectric power, and was spun off in 2004; the Norwegian state owns about a third. Based in Oslo, it is one of the largest producers of nitrogen fertilizers, with plants in Europe, the Americas and Australia.

OCP Group

Founded in 1920 and owned almost entirely by the Moroccan state, OCP mines the country's phosphate rock - around 70% of known world reserves - and processes much of it at the Jorf Lasfar complex into phosphoric acid and fertilizers. It is the world's largest exporter of phosphate products, with Africa, India and Brazil as major markets.

Mosaic

Mosaic was formed in 2004 from IMC Global and Cargill's fertilizer business, is based in Tampa, Florida, and listed in New York. It mines phosphate in Florida and potash in Saskatchewan and is a major fertilizer distributor in Brazil.

ICL Group

Based in Tel Aviv and listed there and in New York, ICL is controlled by Israel Corporation. It extracts potash and bromine from the Dead Sea under a state concession that runs until 2030, mines potash in Spain and makes specialty fertilizers and phosphate-based food ingredients.

CF Industries

CF Industries began in 1946 as a fertilizer cooperative of US farm supply co-ops and has been listed in New York since 2005. Based near Chicago, it is one of the largest makers of ammonia and other nitrogen fertilizers; its Donaldsonville site in Louisiana is the world's largest nitrogen complex, and it is building a low-carbon ammonia plant there with Japan's JERA and Mitsui.

PhosAgro

PhosAgro is based in Moscow and makes phosphate fertilizers from apatite mined on the Kola Peninsula. Its founder Andrey Guryev is under Western sanctions; fertilizer exports themselves were largely exempt, but the EU has been raising tariffs on Russian fertilizers since July 2025.

Yunnan Yuntianhua

Controlled by the government of Yunnan province and listed in Shanghai, Yuntianhua is China's largest phosphate fertilizer producer, mining phosphate rock in Yunnan. It also makes nitrogen fertilizer and phosphorus chemicals.

K+S

K+S, based in Kassel and listed in Frankfurt, traces its roots to 1889. It mines potash and magnesium salts in Germany and has operated the Bethune potash mine in Saskatchewan since 2017; it also sells salt for de-icing, food and industry in Europe.

SABIC Agri-Nutrients

Founded in 1965 as the Saudi Arabian Fertilizer Company (SAFCO) and listed in Riyadh, the company is 50.1% owned by the chemical group SABIC, itself majority-owned by Saudi Aramco. Based in Al Jubail, it makes urea and ammonia from Saudi natural gas and exports most of it.

Raw materials decide who is big

Because the raw materials sit in a few places, so do the producers. Morocco holds about 70% of the world's known phosphate rock reserves (USGS), which makes the state company OCP one of the leading suppliers of phosphates. Potash comes mainly from Canada, Russia and Belarus, where Nutrien, Uralkali and Belaruskali mine it. Nitrogen producers cluster where gas is cheap - North America, the Middle East, Russia - which is why urea prices follow natural gas, as explained in Fertilizer Prices and Natural Gas.

Politics and trade

Fertilizer trade is shaped by governments as much as by costs. Sanctions on Belarusian potash and the war in Ukraine reshuffled potash and nitrogen flows from 2022, the EU has raised tariffs on fertilizers from Russia and Belarus, and China has at times restricted urea and phosphate exports to keep its own prices low. Each of these moves can shift world prices within weeks.

What it means for farmers

Fertilizer is one of the largest costs in growing grain, so what matters for a farmer is not the fertilizer price alone but how much crop it takes to pay for it. The grain-to-fertilizer ratio shows that relationship. Other links in the chain are covered in The Biggest Companies in Agribusiness.