India set to be self-sufficient in urea by 2025 even without help from nano

The commissioning of new plants is expected to bring down import dependency to less than half of current levels

Few days back, fertiliser minister Mansukh Mandaviya expressed the hope that India will eliminate urea imports by 2025 through a combination of increased domestic production and enhanced use of nano urea, which cuts down consumption of traditional urea by as much as 30 per cent.

Both factors, the ministry hoped, will come together to ensure India becomes self-sufficient in urea by 2025 and dies not have to look outside to meet 30 per cent of its annual consumption.

But trade and industry sources said that even without the support from Nano, India is on course to achieving near self-sufficiency in urea within the next few years.

This is on the back of commissioning six new conventional urea plants, each with an annual production capacity of about 1.3 million tonnes.  

Of these, the Barauni and Sindhri plants will be commissioned by September, the others in the next 3-4 years.

Once all of these public sector urea plants come on stream, India’s total domestic urea output will rise by 7.8-8 million tonnes.

This, when added to the existing production of 25 million tonnes per annum, will take the annual availability of the fertiliser to almost 33 million tonnes.

India consumes around 35 million tonnes of urea at present.

Therefore, once all the existing plants come on stream, reliance on imports will automatically go down to just around 1-3 million tonnes a year as against the current 7-9 million tonnes.

“This will not only make us almost self-sufficient in urea production but also lower the requirement of floating open global tenders to import urea each year, which sometimes leads to cartelisation among global players to India's detriment,” a senior industry official said.

He said once India becomes a marginal importer in the global urea market, a lot of problems associated with rising international rates will automatically go away.

“On top of all these, the Central government is signing long-term contracts with countries such as Oman for supply of about 1 million tonnes of urea per annum. This should further eliminate the need for big imports,” the official commented.

The Nano Plan

Commercial production of nano urea started on August 1, 2021 by Iffco and Rashtriya Chemicals and Fertilizers Ltd (RCF).

Thereafter, a plan was drawn up to scale up nano urea iutput in eight plants of IFFCO and RCF in various phases starting August 2021, which together will produce around 440 million bottles of 500 ml nano urea. (see chart)

This will be equivalent to around 20 million tonnes of urea.

Since the launch of nano urea, the government has dispatched some 39 million bottles of nano urea to be sold via various outlets of Iffco and RCF, of which around 28.7 million bottles have been sold.

This is equivalent to around 1.3 million tonnes of conventional urea.

According to a ministry official, the government will save foreign exchange of about Rs 40,000 crore a year due to a reduction in imports.

One bottle of nano urea is equivalent to one bag of urea.

Its application can effectively lead to a reduction in soil, water and air pollution caused by the overuse of chemical fertilisers.

At present, nano urea capacity is 50 million bottles per year.

Cooperative major Iffco has introduced innovative nano urea in the market. Commercial production had started on August 1, 2021, from its Kalol unit in Gujarat.

Seven more nano urea plants are being set up by Iffco as well as two state-owned firms, RCF and NFL. Iffco transferred nano urea technology to these two public sector undertakings free of cost.

Officials said use of nano urea will lead to an increase in farmer income. This would be on account of reduction in input cost, higher crop yield and better prices, in view of better quality crops.

It is estimated that an average Rs 4,000 per acre increase is possible in farmer income by using nano urea.

The government will assess the effectiveness of nano urea conducted field studies in 43 locations across 13 crops in 2019-20 under different agro-climatic zones.

The studies as per government reports conducted in association with ICAR and Krishi Vigyan Kendra showed eight per cent increase in crop yields in foliar application of nano urea.

Private sector in wait-and-watch mode

The private sector, which is a major player in the country’s fertiliser space, has been so far in wait-and-watch mode as far as nano urea is concerned.

Being a patented product by the government, they will have to get a license to produce it in their plants.

However, industry players said they want to assess its effectiveness and cost before undergoing large-scale production and sale through their channels.

Several private players said that nano urea is essentially suitable for foliar application (that is, from the top through a sprayer on the leaves), while conventional urea is applied at the roots of the plants. Therefore, it needs to closely analysed for effectiveness at farmers’ fields rather than in trials.

“Urea is usually applied three times on a plant. While the first dose is delivered on the soil when the plant has not germinated, the second and third doses are applied when the plant grows. In the case of nano urea, as it is meant for foliar application, the first dose isn’t possible while the second and third doses are. Therefore, it needs to see how the product behaves in farmers’ fields,” the official said.

He said also nano urea is a liquid product that needs to be delivered through sprayers or drones, which might increase the application cost.

“All these factors need to be closely studied before the private sector adopts nano urea in a big way,” the official said.

He gave a timeline of one year before one sees large-scale adoption of nano urea in the country by the private sector.

Till that time, the government will have to drive the initiative. 

Table: Current and projected urea capacity at major plants in India

Location	Production Capacity	Commercial production date
Iffco Kalol	50	August 2021
Iffco Phulpur	60	Sept 2022
Iffco Aonla	60	April 2023
Iffco Bengaluru	60	March 2024
RCF Trombay	50	March 2024
NFL Nangal	50	July 2024
Iffco Deoghar	60	Nov 2024
Iffco Assam	50	Nov 2025

Production capacity in million bottles of 500 ml per year;
Total capacity: 440 million bottles per year; Source: Fertiliser Ministry