Indian fertilizer industry is third largest in the world, says SBI report

State Bank of India (SBI) in its "Industry Wrap" report by the Economic Research Department noted that there has been constant focus on "Fertiliser - A New Dawn" for a holistic picture, recent developments and vast opportunities for this sector.

Authored by MD (Corporate Banking Group) SBI, B. Sriram, the report says that the Indian fertilizer industry is third largest in the world in terms of production and second largest in terms of consumption.

The government of India has been consistently pursuing policies conducive to increased availability and consumption of chemical fertilizers and thereby maximizing agricultural production in the country.

Domestic production is well below demand, forcing the country to import fertilizer to meet the demand supply gap.

For FY16, fertilizer demand in India was pegged at around 66 million tonnes with production level around 37 million tonnes.

In the past one decade, Fertilizer production grew by a low rate of 1.63 percent while import of Fertilizers had CAGR of nine percent.

China, Oman and Iran are the major exporters of urea to India with China constituting above 50 percent of the Country's total urea import.

China increased its export of urea to India aggressively to 4.239 million tonnes in FY16 from 0.155 million tonnes a decade ago.