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China-Africa Trade Information Service
info.afrindex.com
China-Africa Trade Information Service
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Nigeria has rich land resources with an area of 923,800 square kilometers, of which 60 million hectares of arable land (including abandoned land).
Nigeria agricultural development has a long history and good foundation. Agriculture employment population accounts for 70% of the whole workforce. The average annual increase in agriculture reached to 3-6% in 2011-2015. However, backward agricultural technology restricts its development. Therefore, it has potential fertilizer market in Nigeria.
Nigeria's poor land condition and low fertilizer usage
Nigeria's land is barren. According to the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development of Nigeria Survey, nitrogen deficiency is severe in more than 80% of the land in Nigeria (nitrogen content below 0.1%), more than 75% of the land is in serious phosphorus deficiency (phosphorus content below 10mg / kg), more than 60% of the land is in moderate or severe potassium deficiency (potassium content below 25 mlg / kg). Due to high prices, the annual application amount of fertilizer is only 1 million tons (of total various fertilizer), only an average of more than 30 kilograms per hectare, which is well below China’s farmland fertilizer usage. Therefore, Nigeria has great potentials in chemical and organic fertilizer consumption and usage.
Fertilizer Production in Nigeria
Because of low production in Nigeria, most of fertilizer is imported. There were two big fertilizer production manufacturers-the Federal Super phosphate Fertilizer Company (FSFC) set up in 1976 and the National Fertilizer Company of Nigeria (NAFCON) set up in 1988 for the production of urea. Because of poor management, the two fertilizer companies have been stopped production for over 10 years. Finally, the government sold it to private entrepreneurs. More than 30 fertilizer companies were established. Excepted for FSFC and NAFCON, many of fertilizer companies were established with different production capacity in different states in Nigeria.
The main fertilizer type in Nigeria is urea and phosphate compound fertilizer. And there is NPK compound fertilizer and blend fertilizer, like triple 15-15-15, 20-10-10, 10-20-10, etc. According to different kinds of crop needs, the fertilizer type may be different.
As for fertilizer quality, it is always low quality. The Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development issued a new Draft Fertilizer Bill in 2015, aiming to increase fertilizer quality, fertilizer production technology and inspection and management. Therefore, people can use high-quality fertilizer. In line with the draft, Nigeria fertilizer plants, fertilizer market department, fertilizer brands and quality are supposed to be in inspection and authentication by government.
In a sense, low fertilizer usage on soil in Nigeria is related to insufficient supply but huge demand, farmers' low income and high fertilizer retail prices. What's more, limited fertilizer manufacturers and fertilizer policy implement leads to the issue in fertilizer application. However, fertilizer usage has been increased in agriculture because fertilizer policy.
Nigeria's broad fertilizer development prospects
Like many developing countries in Africa, Nigeria has great fertilizer market potential. Because there are urgent need for increasing food and plants production, farmers hold great expectations of cheap but high-quality fertilizer. In addition, low crop production drives fertilizer market development.
As for agriculture policy, the Nigerian government works on agricultural transformation. The government defined overall goals and objectives for ensuring food security, the realization of self-supply in grains and export expansion. In addition, the government will strengthen the efforts to support agriculture. In this way, it is beneficial to fertilizer market development.
In recent years, as the pace of fertilizer plants construction acceleration in Nigeria, several fertilizer plants were getting investments, including natural gas industrial park for nitrogen production, Indorama's fertilizer plant starting operation, Morocco opening fertilizer factory, etc. On the other hand, organic fertilizer production line construction in Nigeria is also accelerated. Fertilizer production in Nigeria will go on developing based on vast population and food demand.
