Nano Fertilizers

Nano Fertilizers

IFFCO's nano fertilizers and Amul's dairy products will be among the first few goods that the first National Export Co-operative Society is anticipated to export.

Information about nano fertilizers:

Nanotechnology in fertilizers:

• Using nanoparticles with a size of less than 100 nm, nanotechnology may present a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to create concentrated sources of plant nutrients with a better absorption rate, more effective use, and minimal losses.
• IFFCO’s Nano Urea contains nitrogen, an element critical for plant development, in the form of granules that are a hundred thousand times finer than a sheet of paper.
• At this ‘nanoscale, which is about a billionth of a metre, materials behave differently than in the visible realm.
• Example: A small bottle (500 ml) of Nano Urea is equivalent to one 50 kg bag of granular urea currently used by farmers”.
• Liquid nano urea is sprayed directly on the leaves and gets absorbed by the plant. Fertilizers in nano form provide a targeted supply of nutrients to crops, as they are absorbed by the stomata, pores found on the epidermis of leaves
• Nano fertilizers are created, by encapsulating plant nutrients into nanomaterials and distributing nutrients in the form of nano-sized emulsions.

One of three methods is used by nano fertilizers to supply nutrients to plants:

• The nutrition may be given as nanoscale particles or emulsions, covered with a thin polymer coating for protection, or enclosed inside nanomaterials like nanotubes or nanoporous materials.

Significance:

• Due to their high surface area to volume ratio, nanofertilizers may be more successful than even the most cutting-edge polymer-coated traditional fertilisers, which have made little progress in recent years.
• Apart from reducing the country’s subsidy bill, it is aimed at reducing the unbalanced and indiscriminate use of conventional urea, increase crop productivity, and reduce soil, water, and air pollution.

Compared to the Conventional fertiliser:

Absorption & Runoff:

• Due to their impressively high surface area to volume ratios, nano fertilizers have a better absorption efficiency into the targeted plant.
• Absorption efficiencies of up to 90.6% were attained in a study on the usage of phosphorus nano-fertilizers, making them a highly sought-after fertiliser component.
• Conventional urea is effective 30-40 per cent in delivering nitrogen to plants, while the effectiveness of the Nano Urea Liquid is over 80 per cent

Release frequency:

• The capacity to offer delayed nutrient release into the plant over a 40–50 day period with nanofertilizers, as opposed to the 4–10 day timeframe with conventional fertilisers, is another advantageous feature of employing them.

Better Efficiency:

• While conventional fertilizer has an efficiency of about 25 percent, the efficiency of nano fertilizer can be as high as 85-90 per cent.
• Conventional fertilizer example urea fails to have the desired impact on crops as it is often applied incorrectly, and the nitrogen in it is vaporised or lost as gas. A lot of nitrogen is also washed away during irrigation.

Cheaper than conventional fertilizer:

• The liquid nano urea produced by Indian Farmers Fertiliser Cooperative (IFFCO) Limited comes in a half-liter bottle priced at Rs 240, and carries no burden of subsidy currently. By contrast, a farmer pays around Rs 300 for a 50-kg bag of heavily subsidised urea.
• Liquid nano urea has a shelf life of a year, and farmers need not be worried about “caking” when it comes in contact with moisture.

Current Production Of nano fertilizer:

• IFFCO commissioned the Kalol liquid nano urea plant, Gujarat the country’s first, in August 2021.
• IFFCO is setting up additional facilities for the production of nano fertilizers at Aonla, Phulpur, Bengaluru, Paradeep, Kandla, Deoghar and Guwahati, besides expanding the Kalol plant, for the production of nano urea, nano DAP and nano micronutrients.
• These units will have a production capacity of 2 lakh bottles per day.