Garry Kuhn, Author of Famine to Feast
The Australian landscape is aged in geological terms. It is an ancient land. The soil is infertile by world standards. Agriculture, however, is important to the nation's economy. It supports a population of 28 million at home. Around three quarters of what we grow is exported. In total, we support a population of 100 million. This would not be possible without fertilizers to correct soil infertility and maintain the fertility of our most productive soils.
Two hundred years ago, the fertilizers being used around the world included naturally occurring ores and organic wastes, e.g. manure, bones. There was not enough of these products to meet demand. From the 1840s to the 1870s, guano was mined from the Chinca Islands off the west coast of South America, until these deposits were mined out. Sodium nitrate was then mined from the Atacama Desert on the South American mainland from the 1870s. Byproduct ammonium sulfate became available from the coking of coal in the 1840s with the advent of the Industrial Revolution in Europe.
John Lawes patented a process to make superphosphate in 1843. It was the world's first chemically altered fertilizer, marking the birth of the modern fertilizer industry. In 1909, Fritz Haber, a German scientist, produced ammonia from atmospheric nitrogen. Carl Bosch commercialized the process Haber had researched. The Haber Bosch process is widely regarded as the most important technological development in the 20th century. James Cuming was the first to manufacture superphosphate in commercial quantities in Australia at Yarraville (Melbourne) in 1878. Three of the first five superphosphate plants were in South Australia. The first ammonia plant in Australia to use natural gas as a feedstock was built at Gibson Island (Brisbane), using gas from Roma, Australia’s first gas pipeline. It commenced operations in 1969.
Today, most of these plants have closed. There is one operational superphosphate plant at Risdon (Hobart). The Gibson Island ammonia and urea plants closed in 2023. The future of the ammonium phosphate manufacturing facility at Phosphate Hill in north-west Queensland is uncertain.
Today, it is estimated that 50% of crop yields worldwide are attributable to the use of commercial fertilizers.
Bio: Garry Kuhn grew up on a farm in southern Queensland, Australia, and studied Rural Technology at the Agricultural College at Gatton. He joined the fertilizer industry in 1974 working in research, sales, marketing, administrative and managerial roles until his retirement 43 years later in 2017.
In his book, Famine to Feast, he recounts the history of the fertilizer industry, in Australia and abroad, and some of his own experiences.
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