Hurricane Milton Impact on Florida's Agricultural Sector

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Fertilizer plants, livestock feed facilities, and at least one large flour mill in Florida closed on Wednesday in preparation for Hurricane Milton's destructive winds, heavy rain, and deadly storm surge.

The Category 4 storm is closing in on Florida's west coast as millions of people along a stretch of more than 300 miles (483 km) of coastline are under evacuation orders ahead of its expected landfall near Tampa Bay around midnight.

Milton is the second major storm to hit Florida in two weeks after Hurricane Helene made landfall in the Big Bend region on September 26, causing significant damage to agricultural areas in the Southeast.

Fertilizer maker Mosaic announced it has idled its Florida operations. The company, which mines phosphate rock in the state and produces approximately three-quarters of North America's phosphate fertilizers, reported that a facility in Riverview was offline due to storm surge from Helene.

Milton is expected to impact an even larger number of Florida phosphate facilities than Helene, according to Veronica Nigh, senior economist for The Fertilizer Institute, an industry group. She noted, "The lack of processing and phosphate shipments that will occur as a result of Helene and now Milton will further tighten the phosphate market."

As much as 42% of U.S. ammonium phosphate, 32% of U.S. phosphate rock, and half of U.S. wet-processed phosphoric acid production capacity is located near Tampa Bay. Additionally, about 40% of all U.S. phosphate fertilizer exports and 27% of total fertilizer exports pass through Port Tampa Bay.

Flour producer Ardent Mills closed its Port Redwing mill south of Tampa. Opened in 2022, this facility can produce up to 1.8 million pounds of flour daily from imported grain or wheat grown in the Midwest and Southeast.

Global agribusiness Cargill Inc also preemptively closed its salt-packaging and animal-nutrition facility that lies in Milton's projected path.