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A special fertiliser, nano liquid urea, was touted as a better substitute for traditional granular one that could cut urea costs for farmers, import bills for the Centre and increase farm yields. However, its alleged benefits are unlikely to reduce dependence on packaged urea, as ground visits show no visible benefits of nano urea on crops.
Nano liquid urea was developed in 2021 by the biggest cooperative in the world, Indian Farmers and Fertiliser Cooperative (IFFCO). The central government has heavily promoted the fertiliser since its development.
Urea is one of the most concentrated nitrogenous fertilisers, which readily converts to ammonia in the soil — an essential macronutrient for plant functions.
Nano urea contains nitrogen “in the form of granules that are a hundred-thousand times finer than a sheet of paper”, claimed IFFCO’s website. A 500-millilitre spray bottle of nano urea can allegedly substitute a full 45-kilogramme bag of the conventional fertiliser.
A 45 kg bag of urea costs around Rs 3,000 and is sold to farmers at a subsidised cost of Rs 242. A 500 ml bottle of nano urea used to cost Rs 240. The price was brought down early in November 2022 by Rs 15 and currently is sold at Rs 225 per bottle.
Praveen Parmar, a 38-year-old farmer living in the Sehore district of Madhya Pradesh, experimented with nano liquid urea in November 2022.
“I sowed wheat in eight hectares of land and sprayed five litres of nano urea on half of it after 20 days. The rest received conventional urea. I spent Rs 1,000 more than usual for spraying nano liquid urea,” he told Down To Earth (DTE).
The area with conventional urea saw the crops change colour and the leaves grew, but there was no change in the fields with nano urea, Parmar said.
“I was forced to spend more and use conventional urea on the rest of the fields, too,” he said, adding if he had not applied traditional fertilisers to the standing crop in time, he would have suffered a huge loss in yield.
Similarly, Satpal, a 64-year-old farmer living in Sonipat’s Kurad village, told DTE that he also used nano urea last year. He planted wheat in November 2022 and harvested it in April 2023.
“About 20 to 25 days after sowing, I sprayed nano urea on the fields. But there was no effect on the crops, so I had to apply conventional fertilisers as well,” said Satpal.
The first trial of nano liquid urea was done during the tenure of former Director General of Department of Agricultural Research and Education (DARE), Trilochan Mohapatra.
DTE asked Mohapatra if nano urea was ineffective for crops. “The results of the first trial did not show any effects on the agricultural yield, but urea use in standing crops decreased by 50 per cent,” Mohapatra said.
“We can’t speak much about nano urea at present, but the fertiliser definitely has an effect on crops. However, we cannot precisely state where and how the crop is stimulated by it,” he added.
Other than IFFCO claims on the fertiliser’s effects, a Parliamentary Standing Committee on Chemicals and Fertilisers in March 2023 reported that nano urea can reduce the burden of subsidised conventional urea by 50 per cent and increase the yield by 8 per cent.
The panel was headed by member of Parliament Shashi Tharoor and the report was titled Nano-Fertilisers for Sustainable Crop Production and Maintaining Soil Health.
However, ground visits by DTE found that farmers who faced losses in wheat production due to untimely rain were worried after using nano urea as it is expensive but is not showing any results. The farmers are facing about 30-40 per cent yield loss.
Pawan, a 19-year-old farmer from Bhatgaon in Sonipat district of Haryana, bought five bottles of 500 ml each of nano liquid urea last year when there was a urea shortage in the market.
“I sowed wheat in 2.5 hectares or 25 bighas of land on November 4, 2022. The total expected yield was 125 quintals of wheat, but untimely rains in April also caused 30 per cent damage to the crop,” he said.
Instead of five quintals per bigha, only 3.5 quintals of wheat were produced, totalling 87.5 quintals. “Nano urea had no effect on the crops,” he said conclusively.
A scientist associated with Kisan Vigyan Kendra, who was part of the trials with the fertiliser, spoke to DTE on condition of anonymity. “I experimented with nano urea on my own fields and saw no results,” they said.
On the other hand, scientists working with the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), who are partners in the trial, said one should be thankful that nano urea is not negatively affecting crop production.
IFFCO received a permit to export nano urea to Sri Lanka in October 2021. However, the export demand for it has come down by almost half. In the financial year 2021-22, 306,000 bottles were exported, while in the financial year 2022-23, a total of 158,000 bottles were exported.
This ground report is the first in a series on nano urea.