ISLAMABAD – An official source has disclosed that the government is left with a meager 24,000 tonnes of urea, while local urea manufacturers are left with zero stocks as a result of the 45 days feedstock gas curtailment. In addition, urea imports from Saudi Arabia are also in doldrums.
This alarming situation came from the Fertiliser Price Review Committee (FPRC) on Tuesday and has severely threatened the country’s food security. Restoration of gas to the fertilser industry is the need of the hour and hence the Prime Minister is being approached.
The meeting was held under the chairmanship of Minister for Industries and was attended by the minister for agriculture, provincial ministers for agriculture, other senior officials and fertiliser industry representatives. The meeting was convened to seek explanation from urea manufacturers on a unilateral increase of Rs 190 per bag in urea prices.
The National Fertiliser Corporation informed the committee that it had only 24,000 tonnes of urea in stocks, which were being released at a daily average of 2,000 tonnes to the local market. The Trading Corporation of Pakistan informed that the Saudi authorities were reluctant to export 225,000 tons of urea under SABIC facility. Importers have already refused to import urea until the prices of local urea, which stand at Rs 1100 per bag, were not brought at par with the imported price of Rs 2000 per bag.
A statement issued by the Ministry of Industries on Wednesday said that the Fertiliser Price Review Committee (FPRC) has recommended the Prime Minister that gas load management may be curtailed to 30 days instead of 45 days as per practice of previous years. The decision of gas diversion to fertiliser manufacturers from Mari gasfield, already taken by the FPRC and ECC may be implemented immediately.
Under the directives of the FPRC Chairman Mir Hazar Khan Bijarani, a summary with both these recommendations has been sent to Prime Minister for approval. With the implementation on both recommendations, approximately 200,000 tonnes of urea would be produced locally within 15 days. The secretaries of industries and agriculture were directed to rush to Saudi Arabia to negotiate with the Saudi authorities for immediate import of 225,000 tonens of urea through SABIC facility. The delegation is going to negotiate with them in a day or two, it said.
A representative of the local fertiliser manufacturers ENGRO CEO Asad Umar assured the meeting that they would reduce recently increased prices of urea by Rs 190 per bag, if the government reduced feedstock gas load shedding to their plants.
The gas curtailment to the fertiliser industry started in May and was planned to end on October 31. However, gas curtailment continued till December 31. Woes further increased when the government decided that winter load-shedding would be of 45 days period instead of 30 days. The current domestic urea demand is estimated at 6.4 million tonnes per annum with production of 5.4 million tonnes. The commission of 0.5 million tonnes of Fatima Fertilisers and 1.3 million tonnes of new Engro plant will improve the country’s urea output to 6.7 million tonnes.
