India has developed its first indigenous water-soluble fertiliser technology after seven years of research, marking a breakthrough that could transform the country from an import-dependent buyer to an export-oriented player in specialty fertilisers.Backed by the Ministry of Mines and designed using Indian raw materials and plants, the innovation is being hailed as a true “Make in India” milestone with the potential to sharply reduce reliance on Chinese imports, which currently account for nearly 80 per cent of India’s specialty fertiliser needs.“My aim was to make India, especially for specialty fertilizer, an export-dominating country, not an import-dependent country,” Rajib Chakraborty, President of the Soluble Fertilizer Industry Association (SFIA), who spearheaded the initiative, told news agency PTI.The report noted that India’s dependence on China is near total — with 95 per cent of its specialty fertilisers sourced directly or indirectly from there, except for 5 per cent of NPK formulations made domestically. The shift began in 2005 when European suppliers started sourcing from China for Indian buyers, allowing Chinese companies to gradually dominate global supply chains.Chakraborty, who risked his business during the long R&D phase, described the challenges: “R&D means a failure game a thousand times. Have you only succeeded once after failing for a thousand times? So it’s common to every R&D process,” he said, adding that at one stage he was almost out of business.The new technology has been vetted at multiple government levels and received Ministry of Mines backing for a pilot plant, now ready for scale-up. Commercial production is expected to reach farmers’ fields within two years, with joint venture talks already underway with major fertiliser firms.“This will start coming to the market two years down the line, when we will see big capacities, and I think very soon it will bring self-reliance in specialty fertiliser at least,” Chakraborty said.Unlike conventional processes that require separate technologies for each product, the breakthrough offers a single process to manufacture almost all soluble fertilisers. It is also designed as a zero-effluent, emission-free project, which was key in winning official recognition as a project of national importance.“This particular technology is a zero effluent project. There is no emission from this project. So that’s why this was one of the grounds that the Ministry of Mines has taken into consideration and given it a project of national importance,” he explained.The indigenous model also eliminates the high costs India incurs for licensing and upgrading foreign fertiliser technologies. “Whatever technology we have today, especially in fertiliser, is actually borrowed technology. That is not our Indian technology. So for every borrowing, we have to pay a very big price,” Chakraborty said.He added that homegrown development ensures continuous innovation: “We don’t get upgradation with the technology. Then we pay another price for getting the upgradation. But if it is our own, we can keep on developing.”
