Construction is set to begin this fall on the new phosphate fertilizer plant in Louisiana. USDA Deputy Secretary Stephen Vaden said the facility will provide more competition for farmers. “When these efforts were first announced, there were a lot of naysayers, particularly in Washington, D.C., who explained how it could not be done,” Vaden said. “Thank God for this administration, thank God for OCP, thank God for CHS and coming together and proving them wrong.” At the groundbreaking, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins emphasized it’s time to restore this country’s role as a fertilizer producer. “We used to produce almost all of it here for our own farmers; over the last couple of decades that has dwindled to now about 40 percent. If we can’t feed and fuel ourselves, then there will be no be no America for the future.” OCP, based in Morocco, controls 68 percent of the world’s phosphate reserves. CHS is based in Minnesota and said the new phosphate fertilizer facility in Louisiana will provide another source of fertilizer for its customers.
