Reviewed August 2026 against Statista’s global fertilizer production series, the Investing News Network’s USGS-sourced copper and silver country rankings, and NASDAQ’s phosphate production data.
Try it: Run your own numbers →
Table of Contents
- The Short Answer: Who Produces What
- Trivia Highlight
- Countries That Produce Fertilizer
- Countries That Produce Copper
- Countries That Produce Silver
- Comparative Country Production Table
- Supply-Concentration Risk Calculator
- Why These Three Minerals Sit on the Same Page
- Trivia Highlight
- How Farmonaut Finds New Copper and Silver Deposits
- Key Insights & Pro Tips
- Essential Benefits and Visual Summaries
- FAQ
- Conclusion
- Try it: Run your own numbers
Countries That Produce Fertilizer, Copper & Silver
Fertilizer is produced worldwide, but three countries anchor it: China leads phosphate output at roughly 110 million tonnes in 2024, Canada leads potash at about 15 million tonnes in 2024–2025, and the United States, Russia, and India round out nitrogen supply. For copper, Chile alone mined 5.3 million tonnes in 2024 — more than double any other country. For silver, Mexico produced 6,300 tonnes in 2024, ahead of China’s 3,300 tonnes. None of these rankings are static, and below we show exactly where to check next year’s numbers as they’re released.
“Global mined copper production reached 23 million tonnes in 2024, and Chile’s 5.3 million tonnes alone accounted for close to a quarter of that total.” — Investing News Network, citing USGS data
This page answers the specific question people search for — which countries produce fertilizer, which produce copper, which produce silver, and how much each ships — with sourced tonnage figures rather than a general explainer. We name the leading producer for each nutrient and metal, show second- and third-place countries, and give you a comparison table plus a calculator for judging how exposed your own supply chain is to any single country’s output.
Countries That Produce Fertilizer
“Fertilizer” is really three separate markets — nitrogen, phosphate, and potash — and each has a different leading country. Global production across all three totaled 207.7 million tonnes in 2023, according to Statista: 120 million tonnes of nitrogen fertilizer, 45 million tonnes of phosphate fertilizer, and 43 million tonnes of potash fertilizer.
Which Country Produces the Most Fertilizer, By Nutrient
- Nitrogen: China, United States, Russia, and India are the largest producers. Nitrogen is the largest of the three nutrient categories by volume — 120 million tonnes globally in 2023, per Statista.
- Phosphate: China produced roughly 110 million tonnes of phosphate fertilizer in 2024, according to NASDAQ’s ranking of phosphate-producing countries — by far the largest single-country total on this page. Morocco, home to the OCP Group, holds the world’s largest phosphate rock reserves and is the leading exporter, even though its production tonnage is smaller than China’s.
- Potash: Canada produced about 15 million tonnes of potash in 2024–2025, per Statista’s ranking of the world’s largest potash producers, making it the leading single-country source. Russia and Belarus are the next-largest producers.
Key Insight
There is no single “top fertilizer-producing country” — the answer depends on which nutrient you mean. China dominates phosphate volume, Canada dominates potash, and nitrogen production is split across China, the US, Russia, and India. Anyone quoting one country as “the” top fertilizer producer is usually talking about only one of the three nutrients.
Where Fertilizer Comes From: Nitrogen
Nitrogen fertilizer — ammonia and urea — is manufactured, not mined: producers combine natural gas (or coal, in China’s case) with atmospheric nitrogen via the Haber-Bosch process. That means nitrogen supply tracks energy prices closely.
- China’s nitrogen sector runs on coal-based ammonia plants and state-directed capacity, which keeps it the largest single producer and a price-setter in Asian markets.
- The United States uses natural gas as its feedstock. US Gulf Coast ammonia plants benefit from domestic gas prices that are typically well below those in Europe, which supported a wave of new capacity investment through the mid-2020s.
- India combines large domestic urea capacity with substantial imports to cover its farm sector’s needs — a hybrid model rather than a self-sufficient one.
- Russia remains a major nitrogen exporter; current tonnage isn’t in the sources checked for this article (see the Gaps note below) — for a current figure, check the International Fertilizer Association’s country statistics.
Pro Tip
Farmers facing volatile nitrogen costs should use satellite-based nutrient monitoring to time applications precisely. Combining soil testing with remote-sensing data reduces the tonnage of nitrogen applied per acre without cutting yield — the single most direct hedge against price swings in a market this concentrated.
Phosphate and Potash: Where the Rock Is
Unlike nitrogen, phosphate and potash are mined from finite rock deposits, so geology — not energy prices — sets the map of who can produce them.
- Phosphate rock: China produced approximately 110 million tonnes of phosphate fertilizer in 2024 (NASDAQ). Morocco’s OCP Group controls the largest known phosphate rock reserves on Earth and is the top exporter to Europe, the Americas, and Asia, even though its production volume trails China’s.
- Potash: Canada produced about 15 million tonnes in 2024–2025 (Statista), almost entirely from Saskatchewan’s underground and solution mines. Russia and Belarus are the next-largest producers; sanctions and export restrictions on Belarusian potash since 2022 have shifted trade flows toward Canadian supply for North American, Brazilian, and Asian buyers.
US phosphate and potash production have been in a multi-year decline through domestic mine closures and rising import reliance; the most recent complete figures checked for this article are from 2018, so they’re not current enough to publish here. For a 2024 US number, check the USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries, released each January, at usgs.gov/faqs/what-us-geological-survey-mineral-commodity-summaries.
Why Fertilizer Origin Matters for Buyers
- Phosphate supply is dominated by two countries — China for volume, Morocco for reserves and exports — which means any disruption to either has an outsized effect on global availability.
- Potash trade has been reshaped by sanctions on Belarus since 2022, pushing more demand onto Canadian and Russian supply.
- Nitrogen is the most geographically distributed of the three, but the most exposed to natural gas and coal price swings, since it’s synthesized rather than mined.
How to Get a Current Figure
FAO releases global nutrient production totals via FAOSTAT roughly 6–12 months after year-end, and USGS publishes its complete prior-year Mineral Commodity Summary each January. If you need 2025 or 2026 tonnage by country, those are the two sources to check first, not a search engine’s AI summary.
Countries That Produce Copper
Global mined copper production reached 23 million tonnes in 2024, according to the Investing News Network’s analysis of USGS data. Chile is the clear leader at 5.3 million tonnes — more than the next two countries combined.
“Chile mined 5.3 million tonnes of copper in 2024 — 23% of the world’s 23-million-tonne total — while the Democratic Republic of Congo overtook Peru for second place at 3.3 million tonnes.”
Top Copper-Producing Countries, 2024
| Rank | Country | Mined Copper Production, 2024 |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Chile | 5.3 million tonnes |
| 2 | Democratic Republic of Congo | 3.3 million tonnes |
| 3 | Peru | 2.6 million tonnes |
| 4 | China | 1.84 million tonnes |
| 5 | United States | 1.1 million tonnes |
Source: Investing News Network, USGS copper data, 2024
Why Copper Matters for Agriculture and Farm Tech
- Infrastructure: Copper wiring, motors, and irrigation pumps depend on stable supply from these five countries; a disruption in Chile or the DRC has an outsized effect given their combined 8.6-million-tonne share of a 23-million-tonne global market.
- Technologies: Modern irrigation controllers, soil sensors, and farm IoT devices are copper-intensive at the component level.
- Machinery: Tractors and grain-handling equipment carry increasing amounts of copper wiring as automation content rises.
Common Mistake
Treating copper supply as diversified because “many countries produce it” ignores the concentration math: Chile plus the DRC plus Peru supplied 11.2 million tonnes of the 23-million-tonne global total in 2024 — near half the world’s mined copper from three countries. That’s a genuine concentration risk for any buyer, not a diversified market.
What Country Produces the Most Copper — and Why It Changes Slowly
Chile has held the top copper-production spot for decades because of its Atacama-region porphyry copper deposits, the largest known concentration of mineable copper ore on Earth. That geological advantage is why the ranking above is unlikely to reorder quickly — new discoveries take years to permit and build, which is exactly the bottleneck satellite-based exploration is designed to shorten (see Farmonaut Satellite-Based Mineral Detection). The Democratic Republic of Congo’s rise past Peru to second place reflects rapid investment in Katanga-region copper-cobalt mines through the early-to-mid 2020s.
How to Track Copper Production Going Forward
- USGS publishes the complete prior-year global copper breakdown in its Mineral Commodity Summary each January — track it at usgs.gov/faqs/what-us-geological-survey-mineral-commodity-summaries.
- Current copper spot prices aren’t included in this article because they weren’t confirmed in the sources checked — for live pricing, check the CME Group copper futures page or the LME cash price, both updated daily.
- Export and permitting policy in Chile, the DRC, and Peru move faster than mine output does — trade-policy announcements are a leading indicator of future tonnage shifts.
Countries That Produce Silver
Global silver production totaled 25,000 tonnes in 2024, per the Investing News Network’s ranking of USGS data. Mexico produced 6,300 tonnes — roughly a quarter of world output and nearly double the next-ranked country.
Top Silver-Producing Countries, 2024
| Rank | Country | Silver Production, 2024 | Share of Global 25,000t |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Mexico | 6,300 tonnes | 25.2% |
| 2 | China | 3,300 tonnes | 13.2% |
| 3 | Chile | 1,400 tonnes | 5.6% |
| 4 | Poland | 1,300 tonnes | 5.2% |
Source: Investing News Network, USGS silver data, 2024. Peru is typically among the top four silver producers, but a confirmed 2024 tonnage figure wasn’t available in the sources checked for this article — see the note below.
Silver’s Roles in Agriculture, Energy, and Technology
- Electronics & sensors: Silver’s conductivity makes it standard in farm machinery control boards, imaging sensors, and IoT devices used for post-harvest quality checks.
- Solar installations: Photovoltaic panels use silver paste in their conductive layers; farm-sited solar arrays are a growing draw on that same 25,000-tonne annual global supply.
- Cold-chain electronics: Battery-management and power-regulation circuits in refrigerated transport use silver-containing contacts and connectors.
Mexico’s lead comes from silver as a byproduct of its large lead-zinc mining sector, concentrated in Zacatecas, Chihuahua, and Durango. China’s 3,300 tonnes is similarly a byproduct of base-metal and gold mining rather than dedicated silver mines. This byproduct relationship means silver supply tends to track base-metal mining investment more than silver’s own price.
Trends to Watch Through the Rest of the Decade
- Rising solar installation rates add incremental demand pressure on a supply base that grows slowly, since most silver arrives as a byproduct of other mining decisions, not a dedicated silver investment.
- Peru’s silver tonnage for 2024 is not confirmed in this article’s sources; check the USGS Mineral Commodity Summary or the Silver Institute’s World Silver Survey, both published annually, for a current figure.
Comparative Country Production Table
The table below lines up every country named above against the tonnage figures cited in this article, with the source noted for each column. Where a country has no confirmed figure in our sources, the cell says so rather than guessing.
| Country | Fertilizer Role | Copper Production, 2024 | Silver Production, 2024 |
|---|---|---|---|
| China | ~110 million tonnes phosphate (2024, NASDAQ) — largest single producer | 1.84 million tonnes | 3,300 tonnes |
| Canada | ~15 million tonnes potash (2024-2025, Statista) — largest single producer | Not in sources checked | Not in sources checked |
| Morocco | Largest phosphate reserves and top exporter (OCP Group) | — | — |
| Chile | Not a major fertilizer producer | 5.3 million tonnes — global #1 | 1,400 tonnes |
| Democratic Republic of Congo | Not a fertilizer producer | 3.3 million tonnes — global #2 | — |
| Peru | Not a major fertilizer producer | 2.6 million tonnes — global #3 | Typically top-4; 2024 tonnage not confirmed in sources checked |
| United States | Major nitrogen producer via gas-based ammonia; phosphate/potash output declining, current tonnage not in sources checked | 1.1 million tonnes — global #5 | Not in sources checked |
| Mexico | Not a major fertilizer producer | Not in sources checked | 6,300 tonnes — global #1 |
| Poland | Not a major fertilizer producer | Not in sources checked | 1,300 tonnes — global #4 |
| Russia | Major nitrogen exporter; 2024 tonnage not in sources checked | Not in sources checked | Not in sources checked |
| Belarus | Major potash producer; under trade sanctions since 2022 | — | — |
How to Read This Table:
Every figure carries the year it was reported and the source that reported it. Cells marked “not in sources checked” are genuine gaps, not zeros — the country may well produce that commodity, but a specific tonnage wasn’t confirmed for this article. Use the refresh paths above (USGS in January, Statista quarterly, FAO 6–12 months after year-end) to update any cell yourself.
Pro Tip
When you see a “top fertilizer producer” ranking that names one country, check which nutrient it’s measuring. China’s phosphate lead, Canada’s potash lead, and the US/China/Russia/India nitrogen picture are three separate rankings that get collapsed into one headline more often than they should be.
Supply-Concentration Risk Calculator
Use your own sourcing mix to see how exposed you are if your top supplier country has a disruption — enter the share of your copper, silver, or fertilizer tonnage that comes from your single largest-source country.
Run your own numbers
Assumes a full disruption of your top-source country and measures only the tonnage you’d need to replace from other sources — it does not model price impact, freight substitution cost, or partial disruptions. Global producer shares are the 2024/2025 figures cited above; update them yourself as USGS and Statista release newer data.
Why These Three Minerals Sit on the Same Page
Fertilizer, copper, and silver don’t share a supply chain, but they share a buyer profile: large farm operations and agri-equipment manufacturers track all three because fertilizer sets input cost, copper sets electrification and irrigation cost, and silver sets the cost of the sensors and solar hardware increasingly bolted onto both.
Key Interdependencies
- Fertilizer: Sets the direct cost of soil fertility and yield — 207.7 million tonnes produced globally in 2023 (Statista) across nitrogen, phosphate, and potash.
- Copper: Enables farm electrification and automation — 23 million tonnes mined globally in 2024, concentrated in Chile, the DRC, and Peru.
- Silver: Enables sensors and solar hardware on the same farms — 25,000 tonnes produced globally in 2024, led by Mexico.
What Changes These Rankings
- Permitting speed: New copper and silver mines take years to permit; the countries above hold their rankings largely because they have existing, permitted capacity, not because new deposits don’t exist elsewhere.
- Trade policy: Belarus’s potash sanctions since 2022 are the clearest recent example of a policy event reshaping a fertilizer-nutrient ranking without any change in underlying geology.
- Byproduct economics: Silver output moves with base-metal and gold mining investment, not silver price alone, because most silver is mined as a byproduct.
Key Insight
Countries investing in advanced exploration and geological mapping — including satellite-driven detection — shorten the multi-year gap between discovering a new copper or silver deposit and bringing it into the production rankings above.
How Farmonaut Finds New Copper and Silver Deposits
The rankings above are a snapshot of currently producing mines. New supply — the kind that could shift Peru, the US, or a new entrant up these tables — starts with exploration, and that’s where Farmonaut’s satellite-based mineral detection platform comes in. It applies multispectral and hyperspectral Earth observation and AI analysis to flag copper and silver targets before any ground crew is mobilized.
Our exploration work has covered sites in the copper-producing regions named above — the DRC, Peru, and North America — helping mining companies and agri-equipment manufacturers assess new supply ahead of the years-long permitting timelines those countries currently face.
- Map Your Mining Site: For project scoping and a technical quote, visit mining.farmonaut.com.
- Get a Detailed Satellite Assessment: Learn more about how Earth observation supports early-stage discovery.
Reports include indicative location and depth ranges, geological interpretation, estimated quantities, and drilling recommendations in GIS-compatible formats — the groundwork for a deposit to eventually show up as new tonnage in a future edition of the country rankings above.
- ✅ Environmental Advantage: No ground disturbance or emissions during satellite-based mineral discovery.
- ⌛ Time-Efficient: Shortens early-stage exploration from years to days.
- 💰 Cost-Effective: Reduces spend on unnecessary drilling.
- 🌍 Global Scope: Adapts to all terrains — Africa, Asia, the Americas, and Australia.
- 🔬 Science-Driven: Spectral-signature analysis targets the most promising zones first.
Investor Note
Farmonaut’s satellite-based mineral intelligence shortens time-to-discovery and helps focus expenditure on high-potential zones — relevant anywhere copper or silver output could realistically grow beyond the country totals cited above.
Key Insights & Pro Tips
Chile, the DRC, and Peru supplied 11.2 million tonnes of the world’s 23-million-tonne copper total in 2024 — check whether your supplier sits inside that concentration.
Use satellite discovery data when evaluating new copper and fertilizer sources ahead of a shortage, not after one starts.
Quoting one “top fertilizer country” without specifying nitrogen, phosphate, or potash — the three have different leaders.
Use mining site mapping and periodic satellite reassessment when evaluating new supply regions.
Belarus’s 2022 potash sanctions show how fast a trade-policy event can reorder a production ranking without any change in geology.
Essential Benefits and Visual Summaries
- ✔ Resilient Crop Yields: A 207.7-million-tonne global fertilizer base (2023, Statista) supports stable yields even during input price spikes.
- 📊 Data-Driven Efficiency: Copper- and silver-enabled sensors, motors, and automation maximize resource use per input dollar.
- ⚠ Risk Visibility: Knowing that Chile alone supplies 23% of global copper lets buyers plan around, not just react to, a single-country disruption.
- 🔋 Clean Energy Adoption: Silver and copper enable solar and electrification of farms, drawing on the same 25,000-tonne and 23-million-tonne global pools cited above.
- 🌱 Traceable Sourcing: Country-level production data lets buyers document exactly where their fertilizer, copper, and silver inputs originate.
Frequently Asked Questions
It depends on the nutrient. China produced roughly 110 million tonnes of phosphate fertilizer in 2024 (NASDAQ). Canada produced about 15 million tonnes of potash in 2024–2025 (Statista). Nitrogen production is spread across China, the United States, Russia, and India, with no single dominant country. Globally, all three nutrients combined totaled 207.7 million tonnes in 2023 (Statista).
No single country supplies all fertilizer. Nitrogen is manufactured wherever gas or coal feedstock and ammonia plants exist — chiefly China, the US, Russia, and India. Phosphate rock comes primarily from China and Morocco. Potash comes primarily from Canada, Russia, and Belarus.
By tonnage, China is the largest single producer of phosphate fertilizer (~110 million tonnes, 2024). By reserves and export share, Morocco’s OCP Group leads phosphate. Canada leads potash (~15 million tonnes, 2024–2025). No country leads all three nutrients simultaneously.
Chile (5.3 million tonnes, 2024), the Democratic Republic of Congo (3.3 million tonnes), Peru (2.6 million tonnes), China (1.84 million tonnes), and the United States (1.1 million tonnes) are the five largest producers, out of 23 million tonnes mined worldwide in 2024, per USGS data reported by the Investing News Network.
Mexico is the largest producer at 6,300 tonnes in 2024, followed by China (3,300 tonnes), Chile (1,400 tonnes), and Poland (1,300 tonnes), out of a 25,000-tonne global total, per USGS data reported by the Investing News Network. Peru is typically also a top-four producer, though a confirmed 2024 figure wasn’t available in the sources checked for this article.
The copper and silver figures here are 2024 data from USGS, via the Investing News Network. Fertilizer figures are 2023-2025 depending on the nutrient, from Statista and NASDAQ. USGS republishes complete prior-year mineral data every January in its Mineral Commodity Summaries (usgs.gov/faqs/what-us-geological-survey-mineral-commodity-summaries). FAO releases global fertilizer nutrient totals via FAOSTAT roughly 6-12 months after year-end.
Yes — Earth observation platforms like Farmonaut’s enable rapid assessment of candidate copper and silver zones without ground disturbance in the early stages, which can shorten exploration timelines that traditionally run for years.
Map your mining site at mining.farmonaut.com and request a quote. Farmonaut handles data acquisition and analytics and delivers GIS-ready reports.
Get a customized quote at farmonaut.com/mining/mining-query-form or reach out at farmonaut.com/contact-us.
Conclusion
The countries that produce fertilizer, copper, and silver are not a fixed list — they’re a set of rankings that shift with permitting decisions, trade policy, and energy prices. As of the 2023-2024 data cited throughout this article: China leads phosphate fertilizer production (~110 million tonnes, 2024), Canada leads potash (~15 million tonnes, 2024-2025), Chile leads mined copper (5.3 million tonnes of a 23-million-tonne global total, 2024), and Mexico leads silver (6,300 tonnes of 25,000 tonnes globally, 2024).
What won’t go stale is the method: check USGS’s January Mineral Commodity Summaries for copper and silver, check Statista and FAOSTAT for fertilizer nutrients, and treat any single-country claim about “the top fertilizer producer” with the question of which nutrient it actually means.
For readers evaluating new supply rather than just tracking existing production, Farmonaut provides satellite-based mineral detection and mining site mapping to help identify copper and silver targets ahead of the multi-year timeline it takes a new deposit to become production tonnage.
