Sowing season turns into struggle as DAP shortage spreads across India

When floods wash away everything, farmers usually look ahead to the next season as their only chance to recover. But this year, even that ray of hope is dimming for Punjab’s farmers.

As the time arrives to prepare their fields for rabi sowing, they are facing an acute shortage of di-ammonium phosphate (DAP) fertiliser — an essential input for their crops. Across the state, government procurement centres and cooperative society outlets are struggling to meet demand. Reports of farmers standing in long queues, only to return empty-handed, are pouring in from almost every district.

A standard 50-kg bag of DAP, priced officially at Rs 1,350, is being sold on the black market for as much as Rs 2,000. The shortfall has turned fertiliser distribution into a crisis, pushing farmers already battered by floods into deeper distress.

This problem is not limited to Punjab. In Hanumangarh, Rajasthan, a government procurement centre witnessed chaos just two weeks ago when the DAP stock fell short. Tempers flared, leading to a scuffle that forced the police to intervene with lathi-charges. Several farmers who had come merely to buy fertiliser ended up with injuries instead of DAP bags.

Haryana’s situation is somewhat different but equally troubling. The state government has made it mandatory for farmers to register on the 'Meri Fasal, Mera Byora' portal before purchasing DAP. This has created an additional layer of hardship — before queuing at fertiliser centres, farmers must first line up at cybercafés to complete their registration. And there too, long waits and system delays are testing their patience.

The issue isn’t that DAP fertiliser is completely unavailable — it’s that supply falls far short of what farmers need. Punjab alone requires about 5.5 lakh tonnes of DAP for the rabi season, but so far, the state has received only 3.5 lakh tonnes. Another 40,000 tonnes are expected next week, while the government has assured that additional consignments will arrive sometime in November. For now, these are only promises, offering little immediate relief.

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Farmer leader Jasbir Singh points out, “Wheat sowing usually ends by the second week of November. Any delay at this stage can reduce the yield.” In other words, even if the fertiliser arrives later, it may come too late to make a real difference for many farmers.

Last year too, Punjab faced a similar problem. Only around 4 lakh tonnes of DAP were supplied during the rabi season, forcing farmers to turn to the black market to meet their needs. The memory of that experience — and the lack of improvement since — has heightened tensions this year.

The shortage, in fact, is not unique to Punjab. It has been worsening nationwide over the past few years. Every sowing season — whether rabi or kharif — brings a new wave of complaints from different states.

In August this year, Karnataka’s agriculture minister M. Chelvarayaswamy wrote to Union chemicals and fertilisers minister J.P. Nadda, stating that the state had received only 4.91 lakh tonnes of DAP for the 2024–25 rabi and kharif seasons, against a demand of 5.85 lakh tonnes. The gap between requirement and supply, seen from Punjab to Karnataka, highlights a systemic problem that continues to hurt India’s farmers year after year.

The government has repeatedly attributed the shortage of DAP fertiliser to export restrictions imposed by China. During the monsoon session of Parliament, ,minister of state for chemicals and fertilisers Anupriya Patel informed the House that China had supplied 2.228 million tonnes of DAP to India in 2023–24, but that figure dropped sharply to just 0.847 million tonnes in 2024–25.

To make up for this shortfall, India turned to other suppliers, including Saudi Arabia, Morocco and Jordan. However, these alternative sources have not been able to fully bridge the gap. In July, India signed an agreement with Saudi Arabia to import 3.1 million tonnes of DAP annually, and officials claimed the move would stabilise supplies.

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Yet the continuing shortage in Indian markets shows that those assurances have not translated into results on the ground.

India also tried to source fertiliser from Russia, but what arrived was not DAP — the preferred fertiliser for many crops — but mono-ammonium phosphate (MAP), which is less effective for farmers’ needs. Moreover, with the growing geopolitical pressure from the United States on India’s trade relations with Russia, the long-term stability of these imports remains uncertain.

In a parallel effort, the government introduced Nano DAP and Nano Urea, presenting them as innovative solutions to reduce dependence on conventional fertilisers. Prime Minister Narendra Modi personally promoted their potential advantages. However, farmers across several states rejected the products, arguing that they do not provide the same nourishment as regular fertilisers. Later, even agricultural scientists and experts conceded that Nano variants could supplement but not replace traditional fertilisers.

It is worth recalling a Press Information Bureau release dated 3 August 2022, which announced that India was taking significant steps towards achieving self-sufficiency in DAP fertiliser production. The statement was issued when Indian fertiliser manufacturer Coromandel International acquired a 45 per cent equity stake in a Senegal-based fertiliser company — a move hailed as a milestone in securing the country’s fertiliser needs.

However, the optimism reflected in that announcement has not been supported by actual production figures. Data presented in Parliament by Nadda paints a very different picture. In 2022–23, India produced 4.347 million tonnes of DAP. The following year, production dipped slightly to 4.293 million tonnes, and in 2024–25, it fell sharply to 3.769 million tonnes.

In other words, just when China reduced its DAP exports to India, domestic production also declined — undermining claims of growing self-reliance. Far from moving towards self-sufficiency, India appears to have become even more vulnerable to global supply disruptions.