The National Fertilizer Industry Agency, which was dissolved as redundant in 2006 with the implementation of the business process reengineering (BPR), is now to be re-established by a new proclamation, which the Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) and the Agricultural Transformation Agency (ATA) have drafted.
This is part of the revision of the fertilizer policy which the government has been following since 1993. A draft policy prepared jointly by the ATA and the MoA was the subject of stakeholder deliberation on December 23 and 24, 2014, at a meeting held at Harmony Hotel. The Agency will be brought back as an implementer of the new policy, when approved.
The Agency was dissolved with the belief that its job could be undertaken by a regulatory system within the MoA. Its re-establishment will endow it with different powers and responsibilities than it used to have.
Before the dissolving of the agency in 2006, there were 67 registered fertilizer suppliers in the country, all of which would disappear following the annexation of the Agency into the Agricultural Input Supply Enterprise (AISE) as a regulatory body.
“Now the agency is to be established in order to administer the consumption of fertilizers depending on the assessment that we made in 365 Woredas of the country and to test the conformity of the fertilizers to the Ethiopian standards,” Sileshi Getahun, state minister for Agriculture told Fortune.
The agency will have responsibilities related to fertilizer production, import and export, fertilizer demand development, pricing, marketing and distribution, fertilizer quality control, fertilizer registration, fertilizer competence assurance, fertilizer sub-sector governance, and coordination with other bodies.
To carry out the above responsibilities, the Agency will engage in advocacy, encouraging the involvement of the private sector, unions and primary unions in the fertilizer manufacturing industry, decide the type of fertilizers to be imported or locally manufactured, develop guidelines to permit fertilizer production for regional enforcing bodies to facilitate manufacturing permit, facilitate the development of fertilizer quality standard and follow-up execution and decide upon suspension of fertilizers from sale pursuant to the laboratory test result, states the presentation by the Ministry addressed to the gathered stakeholders.
The draft proclamation to Provide for the Establishment of the National Fertilizer Industry Agency, was one of three documents discussed at a meeting held at Harmony Hotel on the aforementioned date. The other documents were the Revised Fertilizer Policy and the Fertilizer Manufacturing and Trade proclamation.
“The major role that is added to the functioning of the Agency is registration of the fertilizers used in the country, which was not implemented because of the existence of only two kinds of fertilizers in the country – DAP and UREA,” Noah Alemu, soil team associate at the ATA told Fortune.
Based on the findings of a research that the ATA conducted in the 365 woredas of the country, it was found that because of the continued use of the two types of fertilizers for 60 years, the soil has lost important nutrients like sulfur, potassium, boron and zinc.
Now the Agency has totally suspended the importation of DAP as of this fiscal year, according to Noah.
“It is like using the same kind of medicine for different diseases,” he said.
The Agency has now began the importation of a new kind of fertilizer called NPS in place of the DAP that the country has been using.
“There are different kinds of fertilizers to be used, such as liquid, solid, and spray and these need to be identified and registered by a regulatory body that could administer the issues related to fertilizers,” paid Noah.
The establishment of the Agency will also embark the participation of the private sector in the fertilizer marketing- both in the production, distribution and importation of the fertilizers that the country requires.
There are 17 soil test laboratories in the country, which will help the Agency import what is needed for the soil in the farming areas.
“There are different formulas of fertilizer that are needed in the country. As seen, even from the experience of Tigray, out of the sampled 160 soil, we need to have 21 formulas. So the Agency will be responsible for the control of quality in the blending of different fertilizers to make the needed formulas,” Noah says.
Now four blending industries owned by farmers’ cooperatives, each costing from one million to two million dollars, are in the pipeline in four regional states, Southern Nations Nationalities and Peoples Region, the Amhara Regional State, the Tigray Regional State and the Oromia Regional State. One in the Oromia Region, Becho, Woliso has become operational. But the country requires at least 18 blending industries to the current findings of ATA. The soil test and study of the remaining 365 Woredas will be completed. The total project is expected to be finalized and publicized in three years.
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