(March 17): The Trump administration has moved to locate backup sources of fertilisers for American farmers at the start of the planting season after the Iran war shut down a key source of supply. “We’ve been all over the fertiliser problem,” White House National Economic Council director Kevin Hassett said on CNBC Tuesday. “It’s almost planting season and there’s a lot of fertiliser that usually goes down.”Fuel suppliesOne facility in Qatar had produced so much fertiliser that it supplied “maybe about 20%” of the US market, according to Hassett. He echoed US President Donald Trump on the timeline of the war, saying that it would be over “in the short run". If the conflict “were to be extended, it wouldn’t really disrupt the US economy very much at all", Hassett added.

Source: The Edge Markets March 17, 2026 13:07 UTC