337,246t of fertiliser was sold in the first two quarters of the fertiliser year for 2024, according to the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM).
This represents a 7% decrease (25,485t) on the same period in the previous year when some 362,731t of fertilisers were sold.
The National Fertiliser Database shows that between October 1, 2023 and March 31, 2024, 184,782t of compound and 152,464t of straight fertilisers were sold.
Almost 124,000t of nutrient was sold in the period, which is down over 6% on the previous year.
DAFM previously confirmed that total fertiliser sales in Q1 2024, covering from October 1 to December 31, 2023, stood at 14,505t.
This means that over 320,000t of fertiliser was bought in the first three months of this year.
Fertiliser
The data shows that a total of 323,000t of nitrogen (N) fertiliser was sold in the first two quarters of the 2024 fertiliser year, which is down by 6.5% on the same period in the previous year.
There has been a decrease of almost 17% in sales of phosphorous (P) falling from 210,000t to 175,910t, while potassium (K) sales are back 11% to 191,810t.
The most popular compound fertilisers based on sales over the period were 18-6-12 (41,000t), 27-2.5-5 (26,000t) and 24-2.5-10 (23,000t).
Up to the end of Q2, almost 4,700t of protected urea compounds were sold.
The department said that over 36,000t of straight urea (46%), 22,000t of straight protected urea (46%) and nearly 24,000t of Calcium Ammonium Nitrate (CAN) 27% was sold in the period.
Fertiliser prices fell by nearly 40% over the 12 months to March 2024, according to data published earlier this month by the Central Statistics Office (CSO).
However the research also showed that the prices paid to farmers for their produce in some cases declined considerably in the 12 months to March 2024.