Name: Iran War Sends Shockwaves From Energy Markets to Global Food Supply
Uploaded: 2026-03-30T21:40:44.000Z
Duration: 13 min 10 s
Description: 【看影片學英語】數萬部 YouTube 影片，搭配英漢字典即點即查，輕鬆掌握單字發音與用法，長久累積看電影不必再看字幕。

This is a story about the other shoe dropping.

這是一個關於另一隻鞋子掉下來的故事。

程度副詞

The war in Iran has sent the price of oil and natural gas soaring, putting pressure on just about everyone, from central banks trying to deal with inflation.

伊朗的戰爭已經讓石油和天然氣的價格飆升，給從中央銀行試圖應對通貨膨脹的每個人都帶來了壓力。

The economics effect could be bigger, they could be smaller, they could be much smaller or much bigger.

經濟效應可能更大，也可能更小，可能小很多或大很多。

To people filling their tanks at the gas station.

對於在加油站加油的人們來說。

Before the gas prices went up, I could fill my car up for like $30, $35.

在油價上漲之前，我大概花 30、35 美元就能加滿我的車。

But the Strait of Hormuz isn't just affecting energy prices.

但荷姆茲海峽不只影響能源價格。

It's also hitting farmers who need fertilizer for the crops they're about to plant.

它也衝擊了需要肥料來種植作物準備播種的農民。

What's happening to farmers right now is a double whammy at a time when they're very vulnerable.

農民們現在面臨的是雙重打擊，而且是在他們非常脆弱的時候。

Our special contributor, Christa Freeland, was among those who spotted the fertilizer problem as soon as the war began.

我們的特派撰稿人 Christa Freeland 是最早注意到肥料問題的人之一，就在戰爭剛開始的時候。

I am a farmer's daughter, and I'm also a former foreign minister and a former finance minister.

我是一個農家女兒，也曾擔任過外交部長和財政部長。

And one of the first things I thought when this war started and when it was clear that Iran was going to be blocking the Strait of Hormuz was, oh no, what's going to happen to the farmers?

這場戰爭開始時，伊朗明顯會封鎖荷姆茲海峽，我最先想到的就是，噢不，農民們會怎麼樣？

Fertilizer accounts for about 25% of the total costs of farmers of row crops such as corn and soybeans.

肥料大約佔玉米、大豆等 ગ્રેન પાક 農民總成本的 25%。

And since the war with Iran began, prices for nitrogen-based fertilizer have risen dramatically.

自從與伊朗的戰爭開始以來，氮基肥料的價格已大幅上漲。

We have seen a major impact on global nitrogen phosphate values.

我們已經看到全球氮磷價值受到重大影響。

Josh Linville is vice president of fertilizer at financial services firm StoneX.

Josh Linville 是金融服務公司 StoneX 的肥料業務副總裁。

Of course, as most farmers will tell you, those prices have skyrocketed,

當然，正如大多數農民會告訴你的，那些價格已經飆升，

and it's based on the fear of a lack of supply that's out there.

We have seen, because of the shutdown of the Persian Gulf, the global S&D for nitrogen and phosphate as well, which isn't getting as much traction, not as much attention.

由於波斯灣的關閉，我們也看到了全球氮和磷的供需情況，這並沒有引起像樣的關注，也沒有得到太多注意。

We are seeing both of those get extremely tight.

我們看到這兩者都變得極度緊俏。

So everybody is talking about the oil and the gas and everything else that flows through there.

所以大家都在談論石油、天然氣以及所有通過那裡的商品。

Few people know urea, being the most commonly traded nitrogen product of the world, about a third of the world's product flows through that Strait of Hormuz.

很少人知道尿素，作為世界上最常交易的氮產品，全球約有三分之一的產量通過荷姆茲海峽。

When you look at the top 10 list of global urea exporters, three of them sit behind the Strait of Hormuz.

當你看看全球尿素出口商前十名，其中有三家就在荷姆茲海峽後面。

That's Iran, that's Qatar, and that's Saudi Arabia.

那就是伊朗、卡達和沙烏地阿拉伯。

Those three nations represent three of the 10 largest anhydrous exporting nations.

這三個國家就佔了無水氨出口量前十大國家中的三個。

And even on the phosphate side, not a lot of people understand this, Saudi Arabia is one of the world's top five exporting nations for phosphate exports around the world.

而且在磷酸鹽方面，很多人不瞭解，沙烏地阿拉伯是全球磷酸鹽出口量前五大的國家之一。

And again, all of these products are stacked up and backed up,

同樣地，所有這些產品都堆積如山，

and production is suffering until the Strait of Hormuz is reopened to safe traffic.

生產也是以受阻，直到荷姆茲海峽重新開放給安全交通。

Farmers are very affected by the price of fertilizer.

Fertilizer accounts for about 25% of the costs for a farmer.

And this is happening just at seeding time as they're getting ready to plant their crops.

而且這發生在播種時，他們正準備種植作物。

And it's happening at a time when farmers have been really beaten up.

這也發生在農民們真的備受打擊的時候。

The trade wars have been really hard for farmers, for American farmers, I should say.

貿易戰對農民，應該說對美國農民來說，真的很艱難。

COVID was really, really hard for farmers,

COVID疫情對農民來說，真的、真的很難熬，

and Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the economic impact was really hard for farmers.

俄羅斯入侵烏克蘭以及其經濟衝擊，對農民來說真的很艱難。

And then on top of that, you see the price of fuel, the price of fertilizer skyrocket at a time when you're just going into your shop, looking at your seed drill, checking that everything works, getting ready to get out in the fields.

然後在此之上，你看到燃料價格、肥料價格飆升，而你正準備去店裡，看著你的播種機，檢查一切是否正常，準備下田。

farmers' need for fertilizer is so great that they're allowed to import it even from Russia, the largest exporter of nitrogen fertilizers in the world.

農民對肥料的需求非常大，甚至允許他們從俄羅斯進口，俄羅斯是全球最大的氮基肥料出口國。

But they have nevertheless been hurt by geopolitical events thousands of miles away.

不過，遠在千里之外的地緣政治事件，仍然對他們造成了傷害。

So you've got to be able to move it in a cost-effective manner at scale.

所以你必須能夠以具成本效益的方式，大規模地進行運作。

Tom Halverson is CEO of Cobank, which provides financial support to farms, cooperatives, and agribusinesses.

Tom Halverson 是 Cobank 的執行長，該公司為農場、合作社和農業綜合企業提供財務支持。

At the same time, rural Americans in general and farmers in particular are not immune from macroeconomic conditions, including inflation, for example.

同時，美國農村地區的居民，尤其是農民，也無法倖免於總體經濟狀況的影響，例如通貨膨脹。

They are incredibly exposed to trade, buying and selling internationally.

他們極度依賴貿易，進行國際買賣。

Producers have been squeezed quite dramatically over the last 12, 18, 24 months by a combination of lower commodity prices for what they sell on the one hand and significantly higher prices for the inputs, be it fertilizer, seeds, chemicals, and

在過去 12、18、24 個月裡，生產者面臨了嚴峻的壓力，一方面是他們賣出的商品價格下跌，另一方面是肥料、種子、化學品等投入品的價格大幅上漲，

And therefore, economic conditions are tougher than they have been until you go back to the 2018, 2019 period when we had our first trade conflict in general, but

是以，經濟狀況比以往更艱難，直到我們回到 2018、2019 年，那時我們經歷了第一次貿易衝突，

particularly the one we had with the Chinese.

And when the costs go up for farmers, the price of food cannot be far behind, with all that means for inflation.

而當農民的成本上漲時，食物的價格也無法倖免，這對通貨膨脹意味著一切。

Higher fuel prices automatically translate into higher food prices.

燃料價格上漲，食物價格自然也跟著漲。

Higher fertilizer prices automatically translate into higher food prices.

肥料價格上漲，食物價格自然也跟著漲。

And the thing that I think is especially challenging about that is the geopolitical and the political consequences.

我覺得特別有挑戰性的是地緣政治和政治後果。

A lesson that I think I really learned during COVID and during the inflationary aftermath of COVID was what a huge and unpredictable political impact the price of food can have.

我在 COVID 疫情期間以及疫情後的通貨膨脹時期學到的重要一課是，食物價格會對政治產生多麼巨大且不可預測的影響。

The people who are hurt the most are the most vulnerable, the people who are the most vulnerable in the world,

受傷最深的是最脆弱的群體，世界上最脆弱的人們，

and that is the global South, and the people who are the most vulnerable in our own countries.

那就是全球南方國家，以及我們自己國家裡最脆弱的人們。

So that means, in the United States, people for whom food is a really big part of their budget.

所以這意味著，在美國，食物佔他們預算很大一部分的人們。

and Iran began on February 28th, we've already seen the consequences start to reverberate around the world.

和伊朗之間的戰爭於 2 月 28 日開始以來，我們已經看到後果開始在全球迴響。

Just a week into the war, the price of urea rose by 19%.

戰爭才剛開始一週，尿素價格就上漲了 19%。

And with each day, those consequences spread and grow.

隨著時間一天天過去，這些後果也隨之擴散和加劇。

In the way that we've looked at it from a supply standpoint, we woke up Saturday morning to the news that this attack had happened.

從供應的角度來看，我們週六早上醒來，就聽到了攻擊發生的消息。

From that point on, we knew vessel traffic was going to stop because you've got to wait until safe passage.

從那時起，我們就知道船隻交通會中斷，因為必須等到安全通行。

The shipowners weren't going to put their crew and their vessel at harm's way.

船東不會讓他們的船員和船隻身處險境。

And so we knew that if this lasted several days, we were going to have a shipment problem.

所以我們知道，如果這持續幾天，我們就會面臨運輸問題。

But we could solve that in relative short order if we kept it to, say, three to five days.

但如果我們能控制在三到五天內解決，問題就不大。

After we moved past that period, now we started to wonder, okay, we're losing some of the most important shipment times of the entire year from this situation.

當我們度過那段時間後，我們開始擔心，在這情況下，我們錯失了全年最重要的幾段運輸時機。

And we had to start worrying about what's the impact on production because storage is finite in that part of the world.

我們也開始擔心對生產的影響，因為那個地區的儲存空間是有限的。

我們終於開始看到情況成真了。

We started to see oil and gas production go down.

我們開始看到石油和天然氣產量下降。

We started to see nitrogen production go down because it had nowhere else to go with these tons until the vessels started to move again.

我們開始看到氮肥產量下降，因為這些氮肥無處可去，直到船隻重新開始移動。

嗯，我們現在已經進入第三週了。

令人遺憾的是，這件事爆發了，

and we're starting to see the tentacles of the story start reaching out to other parts of the world.

我們開始看到這個事件的影響開始延伸到世界的其他地方。

And what I mean by that, it is no longer just a nitrogen phosphate Persian Gulf Strait of Hormuz story.

我這麼說的意思是，這不再僅僅是關於波斯灣荷姆茲海峽的氮磷故事。

A lot of the world's natural gas flows to the Strait of Hormuz.

世界上大部分的天然氣都流向荷姆茲海峽。

India, for example, is the world's second largest producer of urea.

例如，印度是全球第二大尿素生產國。

A lot of their gas input for their domestic nitrogen production facilities comes from the Middle East.

它們國內氮肥生產設施的許多氣體投入都來自中東。

Their production rates are falling drastically because they don't have the input to produce that finished good.

由於缺乏投入來生產成品，它們的生產率正在急劇下降。

In fact, you're hearing stories about cooking gas being hard to come by and prices skyrocketing as they are.

事實上，你聽到關於烹飪氣體難以取得，而且價格飆升的故事。

So you're seeing major global manufacturers starting to be impacted.

所以你會看到主要的全球製造商開始受到影響。

Linville says that even if the war were to end immediately, there would be a delay in getting fertilizer to the people who need it, like U.S.

Linville 表示，即使戰爭立即結束，像美國這樣的農民也需要延遲才能獲得肥料。

And that delay comes at a critical moment.

Our single biggest month for urea imports is the month of April.

我們進口尿素最多的月份是四月。

And you might be thinking, well, that's okay.

But vessels don't just show up overnight.

但船隻並不是一夕之間就出現的。

If somebody snaps a finger, they get a wish,

如果有人彈一下手指，許個願，

and everything is done, we can start loading vessels immediately.

一切就緒，我們可以立刻開始裝載船隻。

And the very first vessel is going to point to the U.S. market.

而第一艘船將會運往美國市場。

It's going to take a couple of days to fill that vessel and get it pushed back out to sea.

裝滿這艘船並讓它駛回海上需要幾天的時間。

And it's going to take about 30 days in total between loading and arriving to a U.S. shore.

從裝載到抵達美國海岸，總共大約需要 30 天。