Nearly four months after launching IFFCO’s nano-DAP in Delhi, Co-operation Minister Amit Shah on Saturday laid the foundation of the cooperative’s manufacturing unit at Kalol in Kandla, Gujarat. Shah expressed hope that the innovation in rolling out the world’s first liquid DAP fertilizer would help the government save ₹10,000 crore in foreign exchange by reducing the government subsidy on imports.

Addressing a meeting at the plant site, attended by farmers, BJP leaders and IFFCO executives including its Chairman Dileep Sanghani and managing director Uday Shankar Awasthi, Shah said there is a need for a second Green Revolution (in natural farming) in the country after ensuring self-sufficiency in all food products.

“When I said the government will save ₹10,000 crore, do not assume that we will cut subsidy. We will pass on the amount to you,” Shah clarified to farmers. According to the recently introduced scheme called PM-Pranam, the Centre has promised to pass on 50 per cent savings due to lower consumption of conventional chemical fertilizers by adopting natural farming or better alternatives like nano-urea and nano-DAP.

The government has made a provision of ₹44,000 crore for subsidy on phosphorus and potash for 2023-24 fiscal (BE), as against ₹71,122.23 crore in 2022-23 (RE). The subsidy on P&K fertilizers, which are majorly imported, has reached ₹16,035.29 crore in the April-June quarter of the current fiscal.

In April, when Shah inaugurated the commercial launch of nano-DAP, it was manufactured in Coimbatore, which is a very small plant. But, the current plant at Kalol will be exclusively for nano-DAP production at a large scale, officials said. The minister said the Kalol plant will produce 2 lakh bottles (of 500 ml each) everyday.

5 crore target

Production at Kalol unit will start this year, once the plant is ready as IFFCO targets to produce 5 crore bottles of nano DAP (equivalent to 25 lakh tonnes of granular DAP) by March 31, 2024. By FY 2025-26, IFFCO aims to produce 18 crore bottles through three plants.

He said India needs a new green revolution under Prime Minister Narendra Modi to show the path of natural farming to the world and lead the way for prosperity of farmers. This green revolution will bring wealth from across the world to India by finding markets for organic products, he explained.

Pointing out that India was importing wheat and rice in the past, he said with the efforts of successive governments and last nine years under PM Modi’s scientific approach, the country has become self-reliant for foodgrains.

The new green revolution should aim for three things. First, to make India self-sufficient in not just wheat and paddy, but food items of every kind, be it pulses or oilseeds. Secondly, to increase per acre production and preserve soil by encouraging natural farming. Third, to bring prosperity to farmers by finding markets for natural farming produce, he said.

The government is committed to achieve these three aims, and his ministry has set up three multi-state cooperative societies to achieve them, he added.

The minister also spoke on various efforts of his ministry for economic empowerment of the rural population through the co-operatives. The government has worked to make primary agricultural credit societies (PACS) viable, he said at the gathering of farmers and urged PACS to change their byelaws and accept the model multipurpose PACS byelaws framed by the Centre. He informed that already over 15,000 PACS have become common service centres (CSCs).

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