Human urine becomes option for farmers in fertiliser supply crunch

KUALA LUMPUR – Farmer James Mills has spent a lot of time thinking about chicken muck lately.

After the Iran war disrupted supplies of conventional nitrogen fertilisers, the Englishman began scouring the Yorkshire countryside for substitutes to keep his crops growing. That led Mr Mills to the poultry shed of a relative’s friend, whose chicken manure is suddenly so sought after that he now has a long list of buyers.

“Everyone is doing the same, looking for alternatives,” said Mr Mills, who harvests wheat, barley and oats on a farm dotted with sheep.

Farmers worldwide are under pressure. About a third of traded urea, a widely used nitrogen fertiliser, comes from the Gulf region. With the Strait of Hormuz effectively shut, prices have jumped to multi-year highs. That’s forcing growers to improvise ahead of the fall planting season or risk lower yields, profit losses and disruptions to global food supply.

Some are turning to age-old solutions like manure. Others are experimenting with newer technologies. These range from waste-based inputs, including materials like ground almond shells, to microbial products designed to boost plant growth and reduce reliance on chemical fertilisers.

“The war situation is, sadly, a good thing for us,” said Mr Francois Gerard of French start-up Toopi Organics, which converts human urine collected from schools and festivals into a bacteria feed that helps plants grow. Since late February, sales have jumped about a quarter, he said, with prices holding steady thanks to abundant supply.

“We have urine everywhere,” he said.

Because farmers plan months ahead, the effects risk rippling into yields as far out as 2027, according to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization. The World Bank expects fertiliser prices to rise by nearly a third in 2026, pushing affordability to its worst level since 2022, when Russia invaded Ukraine.

The crisis is giving fresh momentum to products that have long struggled to gain widespread adoption because farmers viewed them as less reliable than synthetic fertilisers.

In Malaysia, dairy producer Farm Fresh feeds livestock waste to worms, which enrich the grass its cows graze on. The company has used the method for years but is leaning on it more heavily as urea costs jump.

“That is nature’s best fertiliser,” said Chief Financial Officer Mohd Khairul Mat Hassan. “And we top it with chicken dung.”

Demand for biofertilisers and biostimulants is also rising. Adoption has historically been limited by cost and inconsistent performance, but companies say farmers are becoming more willing to experiment.

Syngenta, which has produced biological products for decades, says it’s seeing rising interest. In Thailand, startup Living Roots has hired staff to keep up with demand. And US-based Holganix says its business has more than doubled this year.

“We really feel like this fall is going to be an explosion,” said Holganix Chief Revenue Officer Bryan Hansel.

Producers are racing to turn what may be a temporary supply shock into lasting market share gains. 

Pivot Bio – a firm backed by one of Bill Gates’ ventures and funded with some US$700 million (S$895 million) – cut prices by roughly 15 per cent early in the conflict, widening its cost advantage over conventional fertilisers and helping introduce its products to more US farmers, Chief Executive Officer Chris Abbott said.

New Orleans urea prices reached US$710 a ton in April, the highest since spring 2022, before falling. Egyptian urea has climbed more than 90 per cent since the war started, hitting US$940 a ton, according to data from Bloomberg Green Markets.

Alternatives vary widely in price. Living Roots’ PhotoBoost costs about 400 baht (S$15.6) per rai, versus roughly 1,200 baht for a bag of urea. The company says its products can reduce chemical fertiliser use by as much as 50 per cent, cutting costs by about 20 per cent.

Hundreds of farmers have signed on to a Pivot Bio program allowing them to lock in prices for three years. As fertiliser prices climbed, the company’s products – already cheaper than conventional options – gained a cost advantage of as much as 65 per cent, Mr Abbott said.

And chicken muck? Roughly £10 (S$17.1) a ton, according to Mr Mills – though transport costs add up.

“It’s not a case of ‘we’ll all just switch to muck,’” Mr Mills said. “Life isn’t that simple.”

Scaling up also remains a major hurdle. Many farmers are still wary of unfamiliar products after decades of relying on conventional fertilisers. Some biological solutions struggle with consistency – microbes, for instance, can wash away from plant roots.

Start-ups face supply constraints. Toopi needs to boost its urine collection in 2027. California-based Nitricity, which makes fertilisers from ground almond shells, is building new production capacity and is sold out through 2028.

Produced largely from natural gas, synthetic nitrogen fertilisers have underpinned global food production for decades and remain difficult to replace at scale, despite their environmental costs.

For now, the bigger question is whether demand will last. Previous supply shocks, including Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, exposed the world’s dependence on fertilisers but did little to loosen it.

“Synthetic fertilisers have supported global food production for a century,” Mr Mills said. “I haven’t seen evidence that you can remove them entirely and maintain current yields. There are no silver bullets.” Bloomberg