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Nano Urea exported to Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan, Brazil
Scientists of Indian Farmers Fertilizer Cooperative Limited (IFFCO) have developed Nano Urea (Liquid) and now Nano Urea Plus, Nano DAP. (Liquid) was developed. Against which scientists are raising questions.
In the year 2022, IFFCO inaugurated a Nano Urea (Liquid) plant at Kalol near Gandhinagar. The production capacity of this plant is 175 kilolitres (1 kilolitre = 1000 litres) per day. A patent has been obtained. IFFCO is exporting Nano Urea to countries like Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan and Brazil.
Nano Urea Plus and Nano DAP (Liquid) are used to meet the deficiency of nitrogen and phosphorus in crops. Till now urea and DAP available in white granular solids were used. Due to this, the plant was getting less than half. The rest was lost in the soil, water and air. Small particles of nano-fertilizer (liquid) enter the plant directly from the leaves. One acre of field can be sprayed once with a 500 ml bottle of Nano Urea and Nano DAP.
20 lakh farmers in Gujarat are using Nano Urea (liquid).
In Gujarat, 17,65,204 bottles were sold in 2022-23 compared to 8,75,000 bottles of Nano Urea in 2021-22. This figure increased to 26,03,637 bottles in the year 2023-24.
One bottle of Nano Urea Plus (liquid) is equivalent to one 45 kg sack of conventional urea. Increasing production improves crop quality. It is cheaper than conventional urea and reduces the cost of cultivation.
Disadvantages
The country’s largest fertilizer manufacturer Indian Farmers Fertilizer Cooperative (IFFCO) says that this has been scientifically proven. In fact, nano urea hardly has any properties that can be scientifically proven or validated. Opinion papers called it a bad product.
Nano urea is proving to be useless for farmers. Contrary to claims, it affects the production of farmers.
On July 25, 2023, Max Frank, a researcher at the Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Denmark, and Soren Husted, a professor at the University of Denmark, have raised doubts over the quality and characteristics of nano urea.
For foliar spray, a 250 gram volume nano urea bottle containing only 20 grams of nitrogen is equivalent to a 45 kg bag of conventional urea containing 21 kg of nitrogen. This is the government’s claim. If this is so, the crop’s nitrogen use efficiency will be 1000 times higher than conventional urea.
The annual production capacity of nano urea is to be increased to 44 crore bottles by 2025. It will be exported to 25 countries.
The expectations projected by IFFCO are far from reality and may cause great damage to the crop yield of farmers. Which will pose a serious threat to the food security and livelihood of farmers.
Nano urea is being sold from 2021 and Nano DAP from April 2023.
6.3 crore bottles of nano urea were produced till March 2023. Due to which the import of urea was reduced by 70 thousand tonnes in 2021-22. A target was set to reduce 90 lakh tonnes of conventional DAP through Nano DAP.
Trilochan Mohapatra, former Director General of the Department of Agricultural Research and Education (DARE), said that the first test of nano urea was done during his tenure. The results of that test showed that it did not make any difference to the yield. But the use of urea in standing crops has been reduced by 50 percent. It cannot be said with certainty where and how much it stimulates in the crop.
J.K. Nandal down, retired chief scientist of Krishi Vigyan Kendra, Sonipat, Haryana, says that the important thing is at what stage the farmer uses it. It has a limit, it can be used only when the leaves appear. It will be available as a limited option. He is also silent on his claims of increasing yield. Nandal explains that there has been some haste in bringing nano liquid urea.
Increasing cost
Instead of reducing the cost in the fields, the use of nano urea has increased. It is advisable to mix 2 to 4 ml of nano urea drops in one liter of water.
Spraying nano urea from a pump costs Rs 40 per pump. Which is much more expensive than the price of conventional urea.
Data
The Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) must have data of at least three seasons to approve any new fertilizer. According to public data of nano urea testing, 13 crops have been tested at 43 locations (stations) and 94 crops have been tested in 21 states in 4 seasons for research and farmer field trials. However, there is no data for three seasons for any one crop. So far, only data of two seasons of a crop is available.
It would be better to have crop trial data of three years and six seasons to support this, says N Raghuram, professor at Delhi-based Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University and former chairman of the International Nitrogen Initiative. When the government approved nano urea in 2021, its trial data was available on very few crops. The government did not even have data for the entire three seasons of use of nano urea on any crop. Future
It cannot be said right now what will be the result. We do not know what is the lab result of nano urea.
According to the parliamentary committee reportThe biosafety and toxicity testing of Bik, Nano Urea has been done based on the guidelines of the Department of Biotechnology. These guidelines have been prepared by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and are recognised globally. Any product that does not pass the critical tests from Phase 1 to Phase 3, we do not consider it a superior product. If there was no immediate emergency then Nano Urea should have been introduced to farmers after the completion of the tests, says Raghuram.
