The Dangote Industries Limited’s urea fertiliser plant currently pushes out a minimum of 120 trucks per day across the country to meet local demands and exports.
Built to tap into Nigeria’s demand for fertiliser, a critical component for achieving food sufficiency in Africa’s most populous country, the plant is expected to manufacture three million metric tonnes of urea per annum.
It is also with a view to reducing the nation’s fertiliser imports and generating $400m annual foreign exchange from export to Africa countries.
In a statement on Sunday, the company’s Group Executive Director, Strategy, Capital Projects and Portfolio Development, Mr Devakumar Edwin, said the fertiliser plant, which has the capacity to turn out more than 4,500 tonnes of urea daily, would conveniently meet local demands and produce for exports.
“We have the capacity to turn out 4,500 tonnes of urea every day.
“This is a bulk application fertiliser that each crop in Nigeria or globally requires because of the Nitrogen content; this is a rich fertiliser having 46 per cent nitrogen,” he said.
Stressing that the company has the capacity to meet both local demand and export to African countries, Edwin said, “Currently the demand is less than one million tonnes and, alone, we can produce three million tonnes; so, we can easily meet local demand and also produce for export to other West African countries.”
Aside fertiliser production, the company already works to support the farmers with training on application of the fertiliser and even establish laboratories across the country for proper soil examination, he said.
“The uniqueness of this plant, apart from the fact that we are producing, is the focus on farmers’ support, on training, education, and development.
“We are now establishing laboratories across the country and even mobile laboratories where we can go drive around and take soil samples for proper examination.
“This is to effectively grow the agricultural outputs across the country,” Edwin added.
