Amid rising demand and Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s appeal to farmers to reduce the use of chemical fertilizers by 25-50 per cent, the government on Monday said that India has ample stocks of fertilisers for the upcoming kharif sowing season.
Agriculture minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan expressed confidence that it is possible to reduce 50 per cent of chemical fertilisers and still maintain productivity.
The combined sales of all four key fertilizers — urea, di-ammonium phosphate (DAP), muriate of potash (MOP) and complex (combination of N, P, K nutrients) — rose 25 per cent to 23.59 lakh tonnes (lt) in April 2026, compared with 18.9 lt in the corresponding period a year ago. While DAP sales rose by a maximum of 57 per cent to 3.45 lt, complex surged by 44 per cent to 5.15 lt. Urea sales, too, were up 14 per cent to 13.93 lt, and those of MOP by 12 per cent to 1.06 lt.
PM’s call
On Sunday, the Prime Minister , appealed to the farmers to cut the use of chemical fertilizers by 25-50 per cent to save foreign exchange as well as soil. Reminding people that one bag of fertilizer (Urea) is sold at ₹3,000 in other countries, he said the government has taken on the burden by making it available to farmers in India at less than ₹300/bag.
“We need to take a pledge...we have to do it,” he said, stressing the need to curb fertilizer application as the soil is getting degraded. One day, the soil would stop producing, Modi warned and suggested that farmers move towards natural farming.
Panic buying
In the inter-ministerial briefing on West Asia on Monday, Aparna S Sharma, Additional Secretary in the Department of Fertilizers, said that there was some panic buying initially (after the war). She also said that the Central and State governments are making efforts to promote the balanced use of fertilizers and curb excessive use. States are taking action to curb hoarding and check the diversion of soil nutrients for commercial use.
“India’s fertiliser security remains comfortable and well managed,” She said, adding the current stock level is more than 51 per cent of the total demand of 390.54 lt for the Kharif 2026 season, which is significantly higher than the usual level of 33 per cent. She further said that after the war, the domestic production was 76.78 lt while imports were 19.94 lt.
The government earlier had said that domestic production for March-April was at 67.76 lt — urea 40.72 lt, DAP 5.39 lt, complex 13.65 lt. India does not produce MoP as it is 100 per cent import dependent.
Subsidy pressure
On the fertiliser subsidy bill, she said it would be cleared in due course to maintain the liquidity of fertiliser companies. She said that against a ₹2.21 lakh crore fertiliser subsidy in the last fiscal, the Budget Estimate for FY27 is ₹1.77 lakh crore.
However, as global fertilizer prices have gone up, with Urea nearly doubling, the government would factor those in when the subsidy is finalised.
Published on May 11, 2026