Acute crisis of non-urea fertilisers hits winter vegetable farming

Several thousand farmers in five upazilas of Lalmonirhat district have become very much frustrated as they are facing acute crisis of various non-urea fertilisers in the current seasons.

The farmers are now very much busy cultivating different winter vegetables.

Many of them cultivated early-variety winter vegetables like cabbage and cauliflowers, coriander, radish, brinjal, green chilli and potatoes hoping to make sufficient profits.

Already some winter vegetables are now available in the market. Farmers are now preparing their croplands for various late variety vegetables.

The main input of these vegetables is TSP (Triple super Phosphate) fertiliser but this non-urea fertiliser is not available in the market. Some dishonest traders are making good profit from selling TSP at high prices, farmers alleged.

It is learnt, there are sufficient stocks of different non-urea fertilisers for the district at Mohendronagor Buffer store under BADC. Ekramul Haque, assistant director (AD) of the BADC fertiliser store of Lalmonirhat, said that the government was distributing various fertilisers to the farmers at fixed prices through 144 no's BADC dealers in the district.

Dealers are lifting their allocated fertilisers and selling to the farmers properly. But farmers alleged that some dishonest traders were hoarding fertilisers illegally and creating an artificial crisis in the market.

Sajol Mia, a farmer of Mogolhat union, said that he cultivated cauliflowers on five acres of land this current season. Within two weeks he will start harvesting cauliflower from his land. Now he is preparing land for more cauliflower, cabbage and brinjjal. He needs TSP fertilisers but it is found nowhere. The price of one sack (50KG) of TSP is Tk1,350 but some traders were selling per bag TSP at Tk1,800-2,000, alleged a farmer.

Iftekhar Ahammed, a local journalist also a farmer, alleged that some dishonest traders were hoarding TSP and other fertilisers for creating a crisis and making extra profit.

Local administration recovered huge quantity of various fertilisers and fined them. Sadekul Islam, a potato farmer of Doikhawa under Hatibandha upazila, said every year he cultivates a huge quantity of potato .As the demand and price of TSP fertiliser is very much high, he prefers to use DAP instead of TSP .

A retailer of Fertilizer at Aditmari upazila bajar said that they don't know anything about the reason of TSP crisis. They purchase TSP from local dealer. But he admitted the high price of TSP. On 25 October, upazila administration of Patgram conducted a drive and recovered 9,080 sacks of TSP and other fertilisers from one Milon Shekh and M/S Agrani Traders of frontier area under Patgram upazila.

The Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) Lalmonirhat sources said 1,715 tonnes of TSP (Triple super Phosphate), 3242 tonnes of DAP (Diammonium Phosphate), and 1044M.tonnes of MOP (Murate of Potash) were allocated for the month of October in the district.

Allocation of TSP is always less than other fertilisers.

Farmers can use DAP in place of TSP as there are same ingredients in DAP. 45 per cent phosphate is available in TSP and DAP; rather farmers can get extra 20 per cent urea from DAP.

However, farmers are always crazy for using TSP in the field. Taking this opportunity some traders are selling TSP at high prices, said Dr. Shaikhul Arefin, deputy director (DD) of the DAE, Lalmonirhat.

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