Massive stocks of chemical fertiliser coming

Govt. price Rs. 15,000 for 50kg bag, but black market price Rs. 43,000

A 50 kilogram bag of chemical fertiliser is selling at about Rs. 43,000 in the black market.

The Agriculture Ministry had earlier proposed to sell the fertiliser at the subsidised price of Rs. 15,000 but farmers’ associations had stated that they would find it difficult to buy at that price under the prevailing circumstances and had instead proposed a price of Rs. 10,000.

About 65,000MT of urea fertiliser bought under the Indian credit line is expected in the country around July 10. The vessel carrying the consignment left Oman yesterday.

The consignment was purchased through a USD 55 million credit facility provided by the Exim Bank of India.

Agriculture Minister Mahinda Amaraweera told the Sunday Times the Ministry had put 2000 lorries on standby to distribute the stocks. He has also submitted a Cabinet paper seeking a guarantee from the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation ( CPC) to make available more than 20 million liters of diesel to distribute the fertiliser, provide fuel for harvesting and transport the harvest.

There had been a significant increase in the amount of farmland being cultivated since the Government started importing chemical fertilser, Mr Amaraweera claimed. The extent of cultivated land has doubled from 275,000 hectares to 475,000 hectares now, he said.

Discussions are also underway to obtain USD 110 million from the World Bank and USD 40 million Asian Development Bank to pay for the import of chemical fertiliser in addition to the government contribution of nearly USD 40 million. The stocks are to be used for

the upcoming Maha season cultivation.

Earlier, the Government secured emergency financing of USD 350 million under the World Bank-funded Emergency Crisis Response Programme ( ECPR) facility to use part of the funds to pay for fertiliser imports.

Meanwhile, the Agriculture Ministry issued notices to procure 150,000MT urea and 36,000MT of Triple Super Phosphate ( TSP) fertiliser for the upcoming Maha season.

Minister Amaraweera also assured that there would not be a shortage of rice in the country till December as there was a 40,000MT buffer stock. From this stock, about 10,000MT would be released to the market every month till November.

However, a rice shortage was expected from December through to February next year and the Government intended to import 400,000MT of rice to meet the shortage, the minister said.