India will not need to import urea by 2025-end as the domestic production of conventional urea and nano liquid urea is expected to be sufficient to meet the country’s annual demand, Union Minister for Chemicals and Fertilisers Mansukh Mandaviya said on Tuesday.

At present, the country’s urea (conventional) production is 260 lakh tonnes, while around 90 lakh tonnes are imported to meet local demand.

 “As per our estimate, we will be self-sufficient in urea by 2025-end and there will be no import dependence. Our domestic production of conventional urea and nano urea will be more than the demand,” he told reporters here.

 The minister said around 60 lakh tonnes of production capacity will be added for conventional urea, while the output of nano urea is estimated to rise to 44 crores bottles (of 500 ml each) per annum, which will be equivalent to 200 lakh tonnes of conventional urea.

 Mandaviya said the adoption of nano urea by farmers has been very encouraging and highlighted that the liquid nutrient is effective for maintaining soil health as well as for increasing crop yield.

 According to a ministry official, the government will save foreign exchange of about Rs 40,000 crore per annum due to a reduction in imports.

 One bottle of nano urea is equivalent to one bag of urea. Its application can effectively lead to a reduction in soil, water and air pollution which happens due to the overuse of chemical fertilisers both at production and consumption levels. At present, the capacity of nano urea is 5 crore bottles per year. Co-operative major IFFCO has introduced innovative nano urea in the market. The commercial production started on August 1, 2021 from IFFCO’s plant at Kalol in Gujarat.