ISLAMABAD: Expressing surprise on declaring fertilisers as hazardous material by the Environment Protection Agency (EPA) of Sindh, manufacturers on Tuesday said the move will have an adverse financial impact on the farmers and agriculture sector in the province.

In a letter written to Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah, the Fertilizer Manufacturers of Pakistan Advisory Council (FMPAC) criticised the notification issued by the provincial government in September that has categorised “fertiliser warehouses” in the list of facilities susceptible to causing environmental hazard in some form or the others.

The advisory council has said that fertilisers are non-hazardous substances in composition and safe in handling as a finished product and this has also been endorsed by the United Nations Transport Regulations and the European Commission vide its Regulation (EC) No 1272/2008 of the European Parliament for urea and related products.

“There is no industrial activity at the warehouse, which may cause any spilling out of any substance that can cause pollution of air, land or water and includes soot, smoke, dust particles, odour, light, electromagnetic, radiation, heat, fumes, combustion exhaust, exhaust gases, noxious gases, hazardous substances and radioactive substances,” the letter added.

“In compliance to earlier directives of the Sindh government the fertiliser industry was using biodegradable plastic inner lining for fertiliser packages, additional restrictions and oversight are unwarranted in this regard,” the manufacturers stressed.

“Fertiliser warehousing facilities were housed in rented buildings in the rural areas, which are not designed for storage of any specific products and the unwarranted pressure of the authorities concerned will lead to higher rental demand,” the FMPAC warned the provincial government.

It added that the frequency of change of warehousing facilities and demand for fresh registration was “insult to injury” for the fertiliser sector.

“The accumulated financial impact of registration of each facility and hiring the services of consultancy firms for such trivial assignments will add up to the cost of handling the products in Sindh,” the FMPAC observed.

The manufacturers have said that the farmers of Sindh will be ultimate sufferers due to higher price of fertilisers in the province as companies will be constrained to pass on the financial impact on this account.

Published in Dawn, October 27th, 2021