Page 23 - NIS English, December 16-31,2022

2022: Year of Willpower Cover Story
AATMANIRBHAR Only by setting big goals and achieving them

quickly can India in the 21st century move
forward. The country's fertiliser sector is also
BHARAT'S witnessing this. In the past decades, there has
been a dependence on imported fertilizers.
The factories had closed. The expensive urea
NEW INITIATIVE coming from abroad used to reach the black

marketeers instead of reaching the farmers.
Before 2014, every year, in every cropping
IN UREA season, the farmers faced the same problem.

However, after 2014, the central government
applied a 100% neem coating to urea, making it
only suitable for agricultural use and effectively
ending urea black marketing. The farmer
learned which soils required how much urea
by getting the soil health card. A plan was
developed to restart the country's five major
fertiliser factories, which had been closed
for years, in order to achieve self-sufficiency
in urea. Fertiliser production has begun in
Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh. The Ramagundam
Fertiliser Factory has also been opened. When
these five factories start producing urea, the
country will get 60 lakh metric tonnes. This
means that thousands of crores of rupees will
be saved from going abroad, and farmers will
get urea more easily.
We are putting equal emphasis on new
technology to modernise the country's
fertiliser sector. India has developed urea
nanotechnology. The benefit of one sack of
urea will be available from only one bottle of
nano-urea. Given the global situation, self-
sufficiency in fertilisers is essential.
Over the last eight years, the central
government has spent approximately Rs 10
lakh crore on providing farmers with low-cost
fertilisers. The central government will spend
more than Rs 2.5 lakh crore this year alone to
provide farmers with low-cost fertilisers.
For decades, our country's farmers struggled
with another fertiliser issue. As a result, the
n About 251 million metric tonnes of urea were country will now have only one urea brand,
produced during the years 2021–2022, which is Bharat Urea-Bharat Brand. Its price and
quality are also fixed.
the highest ever.
The Central Government is reviving closed
fertiliser plants at Talcher, Ramagundam,
n The Government of India notified the New Urea Gorakhpur, Sindri, and Barauni. This will
Policy, 2015, on May 25, 2015, for 25 gas-based further strengthen the availability of fertilisers
urea units. and generate employment.

New India Samachar December 16-31, 2022 21