Minister Barua plays down fears of fertilizer crisis; Approval of new Industrial Policy big achievement for his ministry; he says

By AKM Moinuddin

Dhaka, Sept 16 (UNB) – Farmers will not face any fertilizer crisis in the coming peak season, despite some fertilizer producing units remaining inoperative due to persisting gas crisis, Industries Minister Dilip Barua said on Thursday.
“We’ve taken precautionary measures to avert any fertilizer crisis, as the fertilizer producing units remained inoperative due to gas crisis,” Barua told journalists at a press conference at the conference room of the Industries Ministry today.
The press conference was arranged to inform countrymen about the development activities of the ministry over the last 20 months.
Minister Barua firmly said that there would be no shortage of Urea, a fertilizer, in the coming Boro season, and Karnaphuli Fertilizer Company (KAFCO), a multinational fertilizer producing company, has for the first time agreed to sell all its fertilizer to Bangladesh in the peak season.
The government, however, set a demand target of fertilizer at 28.31 lakh metric tons for the current year, showing a sharp drop in targeted demand compared to the previous year’s target, when it was 29.51 lakh metric tons.
Asked about the causes behind the reduced demand target, Minister Barua said: “The use of Urea fertilizer has decreased as the farmers have started using diammonium phosphates (DAP) fertilizer widely…it’s being produced in two units in Chittagong, and we’ll import if necessary.”
He claimed that the farmers haven’t faced any fertilizer crisis during the tenure of the present government, and nobody has had to sacrifice their lives for fertilizer, as happened before.
“We will build sufficient stock of fertilizers to address the demand….currently we have a stock of 4 lakh metric tons of fertilizer, in addition there are stocks of fertilizer at the dealer-level,” he said.
On the other hand, Qatar has agreed to supply 400,000 metric tons of urea including an additional 100,000 metric tons to Bangladesh in the current fiscal, under a deal agreed between the two governments.
Qatar Fertilizer Company Limited (QFCL) will supply the fertilizer, as stipulated by the agreement, which was signed during Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s visit to Qatar in October 2009, Barua said.
He said the government is also giving priority to importing fertilizers from alternative countries apart from the Middle East and China through ‘state-to-state’ deals.
Replying to a question, Barua said the government would set up three new fertilizer factories, having an annual production capacity of nearly 5.77 lakh metric tons of fertilizer. “Of the three would-be factories, Shahjalal Fertilizer Project might go into production during the tenure of the government.”
Emphasizing people’s participation, Minister Barua said the government would gradually offload the shares of profitable SoEs in the capital market.
He, however, neither disclosed any names of the SoEs which might go to the capital market, nor the timeframe of offloading shares.
Talking about the new industrial policy that got cabinet nod, he said: “It’s a big achievement for the ministry of industries… it’ll play a vital role in fulfilling the government target of 40 per cent contribution of industrial sector in the national income and increase employment generation by around 25 per cent by 2021.”
“We want a strong private sector to expedite economic development,” Barua added.
BCIC Chairman and acting Industries Secretary KH Masud Siddiqi and Bangladesh Sugar and Food Industries Corporation (BSFIC) Chairman Ranjit Kumar Biswas were also present at the press conference.
END/UNB/