LAHORE: The urea shortage and black marketing could cause an accumulative loss of around Rs150 billion to farmers both in current Kharif and coming Rabi season, claims Engro Fertilisers Vice-President Khalid Mir.

Talking to media men at an Iftar reception on Thursday, the Engro VP said that farmers faced acute shortage of urea during the Kharif due to gas curtailment policy besides paying higher prices to manufacturers and another Rs300 to Rs400 per bag to hoarders.

In the wake of continued gas load-shedding, the fertiliser manufacturing units have been either closed or working at much less than their capacity. The farmers thus would face acute shortage of urea in coming Rabi season too, which would adverselyaffect wheat production and pose food security concerns for the country, he said.

The government has to import over one million tons of urea to meet demand and it needed to move instantly for arrangements.

There are nine urea manufacturing units in the country and their production capacity is 6.9 million tons, with domestic requirement at 6.3 million tons. The country thus should not only be self-sufficient but over half a million surplus if the industry gets gas. However, it is estimated that the factories could produce only around 5 million tons during the year due to the current gas curtailment policy, necessitating one to 1.5 million tons of import.

He warned that the country’s urea stocks might hit zero during August and farmers would be facing even more shortage during the Rabi season when total requirement shoots to 3.25 million tons.

During December alone, total requirement would be 900,000 tons against total production of 300,000 to 400,000 tons only. That kind of reduction in urea application to the wheat crop would not only means billions of rupees loss to the growers in terms of decline in per acre yield but also directly translate into threat to food security, he claimed.

The farmers have to bear a loss of Rs150 billion during Kharif and Rabi seasons. He said that his company had written a letter to the government requesting immediate arrangements for import of urea to meet the shortfall. The import process should be completed during November. He said that he was also meeting different farmer associations to raise voice in this regard.

Nevertheless, Mir warned that there would be no use of importing fertiliser if delayed. He said that the proposal should be floated in the next ECC meeting. “We need an inventory of 600,000 tons at the opening of Rabi season or have to face shortage of production which might lead to pose a serious food security concern,” he said.