The Federal Government has given approval to six additional blending plants for the production of fertilizer in the country under the Presidential Fertilizer Initiative.
While three of the plants have received full approval and are already receiving raw materials for blending of the multi-nutrient NPK fertilizer, the other three are awaiting final approval, having already been given provisional approvals by the Office of the National Security Adviser.
When these six new plants come on stream, it will bring the total number of fertilizer blending plants operating in the country to 17, up from five in 2016. The three blending plants will add a total of 1,800,000 metric tonnes in terms of capacity to the country’s growing fertilizer blending industry.
The plants that have been given final approval to join the existing 11 plants are Waccot Fertilizer and Chemicals Limited in Auchi, Edo State; Sora Limited in Makurdi, Benue State; and Citizen Fertilizer and Chemicals Limited in Kano State. Those given provisional approval are Green Technologies, Abak, Akwa Ibom State, and two others whose names were not provided in Zamfara and Gombe states.
Speaking on the sidelines of a meeting of the members of the association in Abuja recently, the Executive Secretary, FEPSAN, Alhaji Rabiu Kwa, said the addition of three new blending plants was indicative of the preparedness of the Federal Government to sustain the gains already made in the Presidential Fertilizer Initiative, which he noted had lifted the country from being import-dependent to one producing high quality fertilizers.
Kwa stated that FEPSAN members were fully in league with the Federal Government’s drive to provide the inputs needed by farmers to enhance agricultural productivity, expressing the optimism that with the sincerity of purpose with which the government had implemented the PFI, the country was already on the right path towards food security.
“You can see the impact we made on the productivity of farmers last year. It is this impact that has been attracting new investors in fertilizer blending and we welcome more investors because the appetite for fertilizer will continue to increase as more and more people embrace farming as their business, while existing farmers seek to expand their operations,” he stated.