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Data

Fertilizer production, trade and use

by nutrient and metric
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What you should know about this indicator

How is this data described by its producer - UN FAO?

Item: Nutrient nitrogen N (total)

Description: Total nitrogen (N) from all fertilizer products

Metric: Agricultural Use

Description: Amount used in the agricultural sector in the year

Source
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (2025) – with major processing by Our World in Data
Last updated
February 25, 2026
Next expected update
February 2027
Date range
1961–2023
Unit
tonnes

Sources and processing

This data is based on the following sources

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations – Land, Inputs and Sustainability: Fertilizers by Nutrient

The Fertilizers by Nutrient dataset contains information on the totals in nutrients for Production, Trade and Agriculture Use of inorganic (chemical or mineral) fertilizers, over the time series 1961-2023.

The data are provided for the three primary plant nutrients: nitrogen (N), phosphorus (expressed as P2O5) and potassium (expressed as K2O). Both straight and compound fertilizers are included.

There is information on the methodology available at: https://files-faostat.fao.org/production/RFN/RFN_EN_README.pdf

Retrieved on
February 25, 2026
Retrieved from
http://www.fao.org/faostat/en/#data/RFN
Citation
This is the citation of the original data obtained from the source, prior to any processing or adaptation by Our World in Data. To cite data downloaded from this page, please use the suggested citation given in Reuse This Work below.
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations - Land, Inputs and Sustainability: Fertilizers by Nutrient (2025).

The Fertilizers by Nutrient dataset contains information on the totals in nutrients for Production, Trade and Agriculture Use of inorganic (chemical or mineral) fertilizers, over the time series 1961-2023.

The data are provided for the three primary plant nutrients: nitrogen (N), phosphorus (expressed as P2O5) and potassium (expressed as K2O). Both straight and compound fertilizers are included.

There is information on the methodology available at: https://files-faostat.fao.org/production/RFN/RFN_EN_README.pdf

Retrieved on
February 25, 2026
Retrieved from
http://www.fao.org/faostat/en/#data/RFN
Citation
This is the citation of the original data obtained from the source, prior to any processing or adaptation by Our World in Data. To cite data downloaded from this page, please use the suggested citation given in Reuse This Work below.
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations - Land, Inputs and Sustainability: Fertilizers by Nutrient (2025).

How we process data at Our World in Data

All data and visualizations on Our World in Data rely on data sourced from one or several original data providers. Preparing this original data involves several processing steps. Depending on the data, this can include standardizing country names and world region definitions, converting units, calculating derived indicators such as per capita measures, as well as adding or adapting metadata such as the name or the description given to an indicator.

At the link below you can find a detailed description of the structure of our data pipeline, including links to all the code used to prepare data across Our World in Data.

Read about our data pipeline

Reuse this work

  • All data produced by third-party providers and made available by Our World in Data are subject to the license terms from the original providers. Our work would not be possible without the data providers we rely on, so we ask you to always cite them appropriately (see below). This is crucial to allow data providers to continue doing their work, enhancing, maintaining and updating valuable data.
  • All data, visualizations, and code produced by Our World in Data are completely open access under the Creative Commons BY license. You have the permission to use, distribute, and reproduce these in any medium, provided the source and authors are credited.

Citations

How to cite this page

To cite this page overall, including any descriptions, FAQs or explanations of the data authored by Our World in Data, please use the following citation:

“Data Page: Nitrogen fertilizer use”, part of the following publication: Hannah Ritchie, Pablo Rosado, and Max Roser (2023) - “Agricultural Production”. Data adapted from Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Retrieved from https://archive.ourworldindata.org/20260415-074647/grapher/fertilizer-use.html [online resource] (archived on April 15, 2026).

How to cite this data

In-line citationIf you have limited space (e.g. in data visualizations), you can use this abbreviated in-line citation:

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (2025) – with major processing by Our World in Data

Full citation

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (2025) – with major processing by Our World in Data. “Nitrogen fertilizer use – UN FAO” [dataset]. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, “Land, Inputs and Sustainability: Fertilizers by Nutrient” [original data]. Retrieved April 15, 2026 from https://archive.ourworldindata.org/20260415-074647/grapher/fertilizer-use.html (archived on April 15, 2026).

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