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| This is a story about one of those unsung forces that quietly keep the world running. It is a story about the clockwork interconnectedness of modern civilization, about how disturbances in one part of the planet can kick up storms in another. | 这个故事是关于那些默默维持着世界运转的无名力量。它讲述了现代文明如何精密相联，也讲述了地球上一个地方出现的骚动如何在另一个地方掀起风暴。 |
| This is a story, naturally, about urea. | 自然，这个故事说的是尿素。 |
| Prices for the humble chemical — yes, the stuff in urine — are soaring to levels not seen in over a decade. In this time of everything shortages and inflation worries, that alone might not sound too surprising. But urea links up several disparate-looking strands of global economic disruption, showing how easily extreme weather and shipping turmoil can cause supply shortfalls to radiate. | 这种不起眼的化学物质——是的，这种尿液里的东西——的价格正在飙升至十多年来未曾见过的水平。在这个短缺普遍存在、通胀令人担忧的时代，光是这一点听起来可能还不会让人太惊讶。但是，尿素将全球几股看起来不相干的经济动荡连接了起来，这表明极端天气和航运危机是多么容易导致供应短缺扩散。 |
| People and industries of all kinds are feeling the shocks. In India, a lack of urea has made farmers fear for their livelihoods. In South Korea, it meant truck drivers couldn’t start their engines. | 各行各业的人们都感受到了冲击。在印度，尿素的缺乏让农民担心自己的生计。在韩国，这意味着卡车司机无法启动引擎。 |
| Urea is an important type of agricultural fertilizer, so rising prices could ultimately mean higher costs at dinner tables around the world. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization’s index of food prices is already at its highest level since 2011. The coronavirus pandemic has caused huge numbers of people to face hunger, and increased food prices could cause even more to have trouble meeting basic dietary needs. Prices of two other widely used plant foods are skyrocketing as well. | 尿素是一种重要的农业肥料，因此，价格上涨最终可能意味着世界各地餐桌上的成本增加。联合国粮农组织的食品价格指数已经达到了2011年以来的最高水平。新冠疫情已经导致大量人口面临饥饿，食品价格的上涨可能导致更多人难以满足基本的饮食需求。另外两种广泛使用的化肥价格也在飞速上涨。 |
| One big reason for surging fertilizer prices is surging prices of coal and natural gas. The urea in your urine is produced in the liver. The industrial kind is made through a century-old process that turns natural gas or gas derived from coal into ammonia, which is then used to synthesize urea. | 化肥价格飙升的一个重要原因是煤炭和天然气价格高企。人类尿液中的尿素是在肝脏中产生的。而工业尿素则是通过一种有着百年历史的工艺制成，它将天然气或从煤炭中提取的气体变成氨，然后再用来合成尿素。 |
| But a freakish confluence of other factors is pushing up prices as well. | 还有其他因素的异常结合，也在推高价格。 |
| China and Russia, two of the biggest producers, have restricted exports to ensure supplies for their own farmers. In China’s case, an energy crunch led some areas to ration electricity, which forced fertilizer factories to slash production. | 中国和俄罗斯是世界上最大的两个尿素生产国，为了确保本国农民的供应，它们对出口采取了限制措施。在中国，能源短缺导致一些地区停电限电，这迫使化肥厂削减产量。 |
| Hurricane Ida drove several large chemical plants to suspend operations when it tore through the U.S. Gulf Coast in August. Western sanctions on Belarus have hit that nation’s production of potash, the key ingredient in another fertilizer. Port delays and high freight fees — plant food is bulky stuff — have added to costs. | 飓风艾达在8月横扫美国墨西哥湾沿岸时，几家大型化工厂不得不停工。西方国家对白俄罗斯的制裁打击了该国的钾肥生产，而钾肥是另一种化肥的关键成分。港口延误和高昂的运费（化肥属于大宗商品）都导致了成本的增加。 |
| All of this is rippling around the world in unexpected and sometimes painful ways. | 所有这一切正以意想不到、有时甚至是痛苦的方式，波及世界各地。 |
| In India, fears of fertilizer shortages have led crowds of desperate farmers to gather outside government distribution centers and clash with the police. | 在印度，出于对化肥短缺的担忧，大批绝望的农民聚集在政府分配中心外，与警方发生冲突。 |
| Truckers in South Korea have worried about not being able to work. The reason? Urea goes into an industrial elixir that reduces trucks’ greenhouse gas emissions and that South Korea doesn’t allow diesel engines to start without. | 在韩国，卡车司机担心他们将无法工作。原因？尿素是一种行业灵药，可以减少卡车的温室气体排放，韩国不允许柴油发动机在没有尿素的情况下启动。 |
| Britons have fretted about running out of the tiny bubbles in their carbonated drinks. Why? A big fertilizer maker, CF Industries, halted operations at two plants in England in September, citing high natural gas prices. And food-grade carbon dioxide is a byproduct of the ammonia production process. One of the two plants has since restarted production. | 英国人担心，碳酸饮料里以后就没有小气泡了。为什么？9月的时候，大型化肥制造商CF Industries以天然气价格上涨为由，将英国两家工厂停工。食品级二氧化碳是合成氨生产过程中的副产品。其中一家工厂目前已经恢复生产。 |
| As for the big question of whether food prices are about to shoot up globally, John Baffes, a World Bank economist who studies commodity markets, said he believed farmers had already largely locked in fertilizer prices for the current crop season. | 至于全球食品价格是否即将飙升的大问题，世界银行研究商品市场的经济学家约翰·巴菲斯表示，他相信农户已经基本锁定了当前作物季节的化肥价格。 |
| But a different picture could emerge early next year, when the U.S. Department of Agriculture publishes the first results of its yearly survey of American farmers’ planting intentions. These will give clues about how growers worldwide are responding to the latest market conditions. | 但明年年初，当美国农业部发布美国农民种植意愿年度调查的初步结果时，情况可能就不一样了。这些结果将为全球种植户该如何应对最新市场形势提供线索。 |
| “Normally, those are boring reports,” Mr. Baffes said. “Nobody knows about them. Nobody reads them.” | “那些报告通常都很无聊，”巴菲斯说。“没有人知道它们。没有人去读。” |
| Not this time, he said. | 但这次不同了，他说。 |
| “If we see coal prices and natural gas prices staying at the levels we are seeing currently, then we are certainly going to see higher food prices,” he said. “There’s no question about it.” | “如果我们看到煤炭和天然气价格还保持在目前的水平，那食品价格肯定会更高，”他说。“这是毫无疑问的。” |
| China is a linchpin of the global fertilizer trade. The country accounts for about a tenth of the world’s urea-based fertilizer exports and a third of exports of diammonium phosphate, another type of crop nutrient, according to the World Bank. | 中国是全球化肥贸易的关键环节。据世界银行统计，中国的尿素类肥料出口约占全球的十分之一，另一种农作物肥料磷酸二铵的出口则占到了约三分之一。 |
| As prices of fuel and fertilizer began rising this year, China’s cabinet in June authorized billions of dollars in subsidies and other support for farmers. The next month, the country’s major fertilizer producers met with the state planning agency and agreed to halt exports. | 随着燃料和化肥价格今年开始上涨，中国国务院在6月批准了数十亿美元的补贴和其他对农户的支持政策。7月，国家发改委约谈了国内部分重点化肥企业，达成了暂停出口的决定。 |
| In the fall, soaring electricity demand led the southwestern province of Yunnan, a key phosphate producer, to order drastic production cuts by energy-hungry industries, including fertilizer. And in October, China’s customs authority imposed extra inspection requirements on exports of 29 fertilizers and related products. | 到秋季，电力需求飙升，导致中国主要的磷酸盐产地云南省下令大幅削减高耗能行业的产能，包括化肥生产。10月，中国海关对29种化肥及相关产品的出口实施了额外的检验规定。 |
| China’s leaders have been paying much more attention to food security since the pandemic began, said Darin Friedrichs of Sitonia Consulting, an advisory firm in Shanghai that focuses on Chinese agricultural markets. | Sitonia Consulting是上海专门研究中国农业市场的咨询公司，该公司的达林·弗里德里希表示，自疫情开始以来，中国领导人对粮食安全的重视程度大为增加。 |
| “They were probably ahead of the curve in realizing how much this was going to disrupt global supply chains,” Mr. Friedrichs said. “And in a situation like that, it’s obviously better to err on the side of trying to have more food rather than less.” | “他们可能更先认识到这将对全球供应链造成多大破坏，”弗里德里希说。“在这样的形势下，显然是宁可粮多也不要粮少。” |
| South Korea relies heavily on Chinese urea for the industrial fluid that breaks down harmful gases in diesel exhaust. Under the country’s environmental regulations, electronic control systems in diesel trucks prevent the engine from running when the urea tank is empty. | 韩国非常依赖中国尿素生产的一种工业液体，这种液体可以分解柴油尾气中的有害气体。根据韩国的环境法规，当尿素箱为空，柴油卡车的电子控制系统会阻止发动机运转。 |
| As prices of urea solution soared as much as tenfold last month, some South Korean truck drivers said they had forfeited jobs that would consume more urea, such as ones involving long distances or big hills. On a construction site, if just one heavy-duty vehicle runs out of urea, the entire project might be paralyzed. | 由于尿素溶液的价格在上个月暴涨了十倍之多，一些韩国卡车司机表示，他们放弃了跑长途或高山地区等需要消耗更多尿素的工作。在建筑工地，只要有一辆重型汽车的尿素用完，整个项目都可能瘫痪。 |
| “If my truck stops, my family’s livelihood, my children’s tuition, everything stops,” said Kim Jung-suk, 47, who drives a dump truck in Seoul. | “如果我的卡车开不了，那我全家的生计，我孩子的学费，什么都没了，”47岁的金程石（音）说道，他在首尔开自卸车为生。 |
| Kim Woo-hyun, 50 — another driver, and no relation — said he spent evenings and weekends in pursuit of urea. | 另一位50岁的司机金宇贤（音）说，他晚上的时间和周末都在寻找尿素。 |
| “I would call up a bunch of gas stations until one said it had some left over, and make an appointment with them to pick it up,” Mr. Kim said. “Then I’d show up, and it would be gone.” | “我会给许多加油站打电话，直到某一家说还有剩余，然后和他们约好去取，”金宇贤说。“等我到那里，剩下的也没了。” |
| South Korea airlifted thousands of gallons of urea from Australia before striking a deal with China to allow a few months’ supply to be imported. | 在与中国达成数月进口协议之前，韩国从澳大利亚空运来数千加仑尿素救急。 |
| More than half of China’s urea exports this year have gone to India. The Indian government subsidizes fertilizer to keep prices low, but distributing it to growers requires coordination between national and state authorities who are often at odds for partisan and other reasons. | 中国今年的出口尿素超过一半都流向了印度。印度政府对化肥的补贴使价格保持在较低水平，但将化肥分配给种植户需要国家和地方当局之间的协调，而双方经常因为党派斗争等原因产生矛盾。 |
| When the fertilizer squeeze hit this fall, Danpal Yadav, 44, a rice grower in the central state of Madhya Pradesh, was already reeling under debt because of low crop yields last season. After coming home empty-handed from visits to government fertilizer distribution centers, he grew anguished and talked about suicide, his family said. | 今秋化肥短缺的时候，印度中部中央邦44岁的稻农丹帕尔·亚达夫已经因为上一季的低收成而负债累累。他的家人说，他去了政府的化肥分配中心却空手而归，他愈发痛苦，还有了自杀的念头。 |
| Time was running out for Mr. Yadav to nourish his fields. On Oct. 28, after sleeping outside a fertilizer center for three days and getting nothing, he returned home and bolted the door. | 留给亚达夫滋养他土地的时间不多了。10月28日，他在化肥中心外等了三天，还是什么也没得到，他返回家中，锁上了门。 |
| His brother Vivek later found him unconscious. He had consumed poison. Doctors declared him dead at a hospital. | 后来，他的兄弟维维克发现了昏迷不醒的亚达夫。他服了毒。医生在医院宣布了他的死亡。 |
| “He was desperately trying to find fertilizer,” Vivek Yadav said. “This is the story of every farmer during this season.” | “他拼命地寻找化肥，”维维克·亚达夫说。“这是这个时候每个农民都在经历的事。” |
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