The Fertiliser Industry - Not Green Enough Coinciding with the green revolution in the late sixties, the fertilizer industry, aided by favourable government policies, got a boost and went on a massive capacity addition spree. But since then, the Retention Price Mechanism, the high prices of petro-based feedstock s and flip flop of government policies on subsidies have led to doubts about the viability of the Indian Fertilizer industry in the future. The main nutrients that are depleted from the soil with successive cropping are nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium.
Fertilizers act to supplement the natural deficiency as well as the depletion of nutrients.
Potassium fertilizers are not manufactured in India due to the non-availability of the basic feedstock. India is the third largest fertilizer producer in the world with an installed capacity of around 110.71 lakh tonnes of nitrogenous and 36.48 lakh tonnes of phosphatic nutrients. Most of them are located in Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat. The demand for fertilizers is mainly determined by the cropping pattern, the monsoon or irrigation facilities, the availability of credit to farmers and the government policies. The domestic fertilizer demand was met largely by imports till mid-1970s.