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KEY FIGURES

FERTILISER USE, Australia, year ended 30 June 2016
Fertiliser type	Area applied to	Movement since	Amount applied	Movement since
	('000 ha)	2014-15 (a)	('000 t)	2014-15 (a)
		%		%
Nitrate slow release fertiliser	1 543	np	166	np
Urea slow release fertiliser	1 217	13.7%	164	10.7%
Other slow release fertiliser	659	-1.1%	93	-18.1%
Urea	11 767	3.4%	1 384	-1.8%
Ammonium sulphate	1 712	-3.1%	173	-9.0%
Urea ammonium nitrate	3 939	21.7%	na	na
Anhydrous ammonia	325	7.0%	40	1.0%
Potassium nitrate	277	-43.5%	48	-13.1%
Ammonium phosphates	14 370	12.4%	1 115	3.5%
Other nitrogen-based fertilisers	1 335	-25.5%	211	-28.5%
Single superphosphate	4 976	1.6%	738	4.0%
Double and/or triple superphosphate	1 276	-31.7%	145	-23.1%
Other phosphorous-based fertilisers	2 871	-24.8%	261	-35.0%
Muriate of potash and/or sulphate of potash	2 318	np	185	np
All other fertilisers	4 051	84.7%	373	23.1%
All fertilisers	52 638	9.8%	5 096	-0.1%
(a) Percentage movement based on revised 2014-15 estimates using the new scope of $40,000 or greater
np estimates not published in 2014-15
na not applicable

• An estimated 56,200 agricultural businesses applied 5.1 million tonnes of fertiliser to a total of 52.6 million hectares of agricultural land across Australia, a 9.8% increase in the area to which fertilisers were applied.
• Ammonium phosphates continued to be the most widely used fertiliser in 2015-16. The area to which it was applied increased by 12% to 14.4 million hectares and the tonnes applied increased by 3.5% to 1.1 million tonnes.
• A 1.8% reduction in the amount of Urea applied was reported this year, despite a 7.8% increase in the number of businesses applying this fertiliser and a 3.4% increase in the area to which urea was applied.
• Agricultural businesses in Western Australia continued to fertilise the largest areas of land during 2015-16 (20.4 million hectares), making up 39% of Australia's total area of agricultural land fertilised. Both Western Australia and New South Wales (incl. ACT) used the largest amounts of fertiliser during 2015-16 with both applying 1.3 million tonnes.

All fertiliser applied by tonnes ('000), 2015-16
by Australian Agricultural Environment Regions

• The scope for the 2015-16 Agricultural Census and Land Management Practices Survey was all agricultural businesses with an Estimated Value of Agricultural Operations (EVAO) of $40,000 or greater. This is a change from previous ABS rural environment and agricultural collections, where a scope of EVAO of $5,000 or greater was used. This change was foreshadowed in February 2016 in Agricultural Census: Nature and Content, 2015-16 (cat. no 7100.1).
• The 2014-15 estimates presented in this publication have been revised to use the new scope of $40,000 or greater.
• For more information about EVAO and the change in scope, refer to the Explanatory Notes within this release.