Availability of fertilisers far exceeds the demand: Mandaviya

The Dollar Business Bureau

The availability of overall fertilisers in the country is 129.92 lakh MT, which surpasses the overall demand of 95.84 lakh MT, said Minister of State for Chemicals and Fertilisers Mansukh L Mandaviya on Tuesday.

“The availability of fertilisers far exceeds their requirement in the country,” Mandaviya said in a written reply to a question in Lok Sabha.

“Nowadays, scarcity of fertilisers has become a thing of the past in the country which has been possible due to the visionary policies of current Government,” he added.

The availability of urea, which is largely used by farmers in the country, is 80.28 lakh MT against the requirement of 63.64 lakh MT, informed Mandaviya.

The availability of other fertilisers such as DAP (Diammonium phosphate) and NPK (nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium) also exceeds their requirements. DAP’s availability is 25.33 lakh MT against the demand of 18.35 lakh MT.

However, the availability of NPK fertiliser at 24.30 lakh MT in the country is almost double compared to the demand of 13.84 lakh MT.

The Minister, while describing the measures taken by the Government to curb black marketing of fertilisers, said that fertiliser has been declared as an essential commodity and put under the Essential Commodities Act, 1955 and notified Fertilizer Control Order (FCO), 1985 and Fertilizer (Movement Control) Order, 1973.

He further said that the state governments have been given enough powers under the existing provisions of the FCO to take punitive actions against those who have indulged in fertilisers black marketing. 

“Department of Fertilisers has also advised/sensitised the state governments for gearing up enforcements agencies under their jurisdiction for taking appropriate action against the offenders, if any,” he added.

The Minister informed that the experiment for coating urea with neem has played an important role in stopping the diversion of fertiliser for industrial purposes, and resulted in keeping a check on the black marketing of urea to a large extent and helped the government in saving huge amounts of subsidy on the fertiliser.