Plant Soil
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-023-06191-4
OPINION PAPER
Is India’s largest fertilizer manufacturer misleading
farmers and society using dubious plant and soil science?
Max Frank · Søren Husted
Received: 3 May 2023 / Accepted: 25 July 2023
© The Author(s) 2023
Abstract
Background and Aims The accessibility and rela-
tively low cost of nitrogen (N) fertilizers have been
a gift to humankind and made it possible to feed the
exponentially growing world population. The exces-
sive use of N, in combination with a poor N use
efficiency (NUE) in crop production, is associated
with severe environmental impacts, and the scien-
tific community has repeatedly warned that the safe
operating space for N within the planetary bounda-
ries has been exceeded. In the light of these consid-
erations, a global player and India’s largest fertilizer
manufacturer, the Indian Farmers Fertilizer Coopera-
tive (IFFCO), has recently developed and patented a
nanotechnology-based fertilizer marketed as Nano
Urea (liquid). Strikingly, the producers state that
it is now possible to replace a 45 kg bag of conven-
tional urea, containing 21 kg N, by foliar application
of just 20 g N in the form of nano urea (NU). If so,
N from this novel high-tech fertilizer product should
be able to increase the NUE of crops more than 1000
Responsible Editor: Jeff R. Powell.
Supplementary Information The online version
contains supplementary material available at https://​doi.​
org/​10.​1007/​s11104-​023-​06191-4.
M. Frank · S. Husted (*)
Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences (PLEN),
University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
e-mail: shu@plen.ku.dk
times compared to conventional urea. This year, the
Indian government and IFFCO announced plans to
massively boost production by building 10 new fac-
tories, with an annual production capacity of 440 mil-
lion bottles NU by 2025 and to expand export of the
product to another 25 countries, mainly situated in
Asia, Africa and South-America. In the marketing of
NU, IFFCO states that there is scientific evidence for
distinct beneficial properties in terms of higher crop
yields and reduced negative environmental impacts.
Similar ambitions have recently been presented for
Nano Zinc, Nano Copper, and Nano Di-Ammonium-
Phosphate, a product that entered the market in March
2023.
Methods In this Opinion Paper, we compare the
claims made by IFFCO scientists to the existing sci-
entific evidence in the field of foliar nanofertilizers.
Results We observe that NU is a poorly described
product with no scientifically proven effects. The
product is marketed with misleading and wrong
statements about its fertilizer efficiency, the under-
lying plant uptake pathways, and the environmental
friendliness.
Conclusion The expectations raised by IFFCO are
far from reality and may lead to large-scale yield
losses with serious consequences for food security
and the livelihood of farmers. At the same time, the
confidence in innovative sustainable products as well
as the science behind them may be threatened. Based
on the IFFCO case, and considering the booming
emergence of novel nano based fertilizers appearing
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all over the world these years, it is clear that much
more priority should be given to scientifically prove
their efficacy and mode of action, before they are
launched on the markets.
Keywords Foliar fertilizers · Agronomy · Nano
technology · Sustainability · Nano fertilizers ·
Agriculture
Introduction
Nitrogen (N) is an essential macronutrient in all
living organisms. In the human diet, N ultimately
originates from plants. The reduction of molecular
atmospheric N to its biologically accessible forms is
highly energy consuming, and is either accomplished
by N-fixing archaea and bacteria (biological N fixa-
tion), or through the industrial Haber–Bosch process
(anthropogenic N fixation) (Erisman et al. 2008). The
growth of the global human population from 2.5 bil-
lion people in 1950 to 8.0 billion people in Novem-
ber 2022 was achieved by a major intensification of
agriculture, referred to as The Green Revolution.
Highly productive crops were bred and selected,
machinery and irrigation were developed, pest control
was improved, and NPK fertilizers increasingly used
(Khush 2001).
To date, the global N cycling is heavily influ-
enced by human activities, which is linked to severe
environmental problems: It contributes to climate
change, water eutrophication, ocean acidification,
ozone depletion, and results in loss of species diver-
sity and ecosystem instability (Gruber and Galloway
2008; Stevens 1979; Midolo et al. 2019). The scien-
tific community has repeatedly concluded that the
human contribution to global N cycling has exceeded
the safe operating space and the planetary bounda-
ries (Gruber and Galloway 2008; Steffen et al. 2015;
Kopittke et al. 2021).
Thus, it has become a major goal to reduce the
N inputs to agricultural systems while securing the
global food production. The development of more effi-
cient fertilizers is, among other strategies, intended
to increase the nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) of
crop plants and thereby reduce the need for apply-
ing excess amounts of N to secure yield and quality
(Kopittke et al. 2021). In the last decade, slow release
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Plant Soil
nanofertilizers have gained increased attention. Hopes
connected to their application include enhanced effi-
ciency of plant nutrient uptake, reduced greenhouse
gas emissions, reduced leaching, and a better timing of
N release aligned with crop demands (Seleiman et al.
2021).
The Indian Farmers Fertilizer Cooperative
(IFFCO) recently developed and patented a novel
urea nanofertilizer (NU) addressing exactly the
abovementioned issues. The producers state it is
possible to replace “a bag of urea” (45 kg urea or
20,7 kg N) by a 500 ml bottle of 4% w/v NU foliar
fertilizer (43 g urea or 20 g N). According to the
company, average yield increases of 8% with 50%
less N application are possible, thus reducing the
costs farmers spend on fertilizers significantly
(Kumar et al. 2021b; IFFCO 2022). The product is
promoted as being able to reduce nitrate leaching,
eutrophication, greenhouse gas emissions, and tox-
icity to flora and fauna (Kumar et al. 2021b; Sharma
et al. 2022). If these claims reflect reality, the inno-
vative product is paving the way for the “sustain-
able green revolution” that many scientists have
called for during the last decade. Having the prod-
uct approved in India in 2021 (Adidam and Kumar
2021; Press Trust of India Ltd. 2022), the first pro-
duction plant was inaugurated by the Prime Min-
ister of India, Narendra Modi, in 2022 in Gujarat,
India (Parikh 2022). Further production plants were
built within the same year. The company plans to
expand sales to another 25 countries, mainly situ-
ated in Asia, Africa, and South America. IFFCO
aims to sell 300 million bottles of NU until the
end of 2024 (Press Trust of India Ltd. 2023a), and
recently started to expand the product palette with
Nano DAP (Di-ammonium phosphate), Nano Cop-
per, and Nano Zinc (Kumar et al. 2020b; IFFCO
2022, 2023).
However, if the claims made by IFFCO prove
to be overstated and far from reality, this might
lead to large scale yield losses and have tremen-
dous impacts on food security, livelihood of farm-
ers, and reduce the trust into innovative sustainable
products as well as the science behind them. From
a plant nutritional perspective, it is rather puzzling
how 20 g N from NU should be able to replace
20,7 kg of N from traditional urea (Kumar 2021b;
Babu et al. 2022a, b; IFFCO 2022). In this Opinion
Paper, the claims made by IFFCO are compared to
Plant Soil

the existing scientific evidence in the field of foliar
nanofertilizers. We discuss, in how far the potential
mismatches between claims and evidence might
cause problems to farmers, societies, the envi-
ronment, and not least the trust in plant and soil
science.
What do we know about Nano Urea (liquid)?
The basic properties of NU particles are listed in
Table 1. The Indian patent no. 400681 connected to
the product states that 20 – 50 nm large spherical to
rod-shaped nano particles are produced, when urea
interacts with 50 – 500 nm long linear fibers derived
from a naturally occurring glucose polymer at ele-
vated temperatures (Raliya 2020, 2022). The authors
do not describe which chemical processes lead to
this remarkable change in size. The surface to vol-
ume ratio of NU particles is increased by factor 1000
(Babu et al. 2022b) to 10 000 (e.g., Babu et al. 2022a)
compared to conventional urea.
The behavior of nanoparticles (NPs) as ferti-
lizers or as potentially harmful compounds in the
environment or food chain depends greatly on struc-
tural, morphological, and chemical properties of
the particle itself or the detergents (solvents) used
to formulate it. Therefore, it is important to investi-
gate these characteristics thoroughly (Iavicoli et al.
2017). However, apart from a TEM image (Kumar
et al. 2022), no morphological or structural analyses
of NU are reported so far. Physicochemical param-
eters like size and surface charge of a particle criti-
cally define the stability and the ability to translocate
across the foliar barriers and within the plant (Hus-
ted et al. 2023). These properties also define reten-
tion and accumulation in the environment such as
in soils, water bodies, or the food chain (de Oliveira
Pereira et al. 2020). The surface zeta potential of NU
particles, a measure for the particle surface charge,
is listed in Table 1. Remarkably, whether the val-
ues were positive or negative, was not stated in the
references found. Furthermore, no studies about
the dissolution dynamics or the N release from NU

Table 1  Properties of NU Property Dimension Reference

particles as reported in
different references N content [%] 4 written on bottle; (Babu et al. 2022b)
1–5* (Adidam and Kumar 2021; IFFCO 2022)
4.26 (Patel 2022)
4.3 (Kumar et al. 2022)
Organic polymer content [%] N/A written on bottle
< 1% (IFFCO 2022)
Boiling point [°C] 100 (IFFCO 2022)
Density [g c­ m−3] 1.02 – 1.06 (IFFCO 2022)
Viscosity [cP] 5.9 (Patel 2022)
9.65 (Kumar et al. 2022)
5 – 30* (Adidam and Kumar 2021; IFFCO 2022)
pH 4.55 (Patel 2022)
4.6 (Kumar et al. 2022)
4.5 – 6.0* (Adidam and Kumar 2021; IFFCO 2022)
Size [nm] 10 – 50 (Kumar et al. 2021a)
30 – 50 (Kumar et al. 2021c)
TEM: physical size 20–50* (TEM); (Adidam and Kumar 2021; IFFCO 2022)
measured by transmission 20–80* (DLS) (Patel 2022)
electron microscopy. DLS: 42.51 (TEM); 35.0 (Kumar et al. 2022)
hydraulic particle size (DLS)
measured by dynamic light 28.3 (TEM); 56.6
scattering. Stars (*) indicate (DLS)
product specifications from Zeta potential [mV] 40.6 (Patel 2022)
the Indian Fertilizer Control 42.4 (Kumar et al. 2022)
Order and are not actual > 30* (Adidam and Kumar 2021; IFFCO 2022)
measurements.

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in laboratory experiments or in the field have been
published.
Nano Urea (liquid) as a fertilizer
The foliar N uptake efficiency of urea is potentially
high; it can amount to 69% in wheat (Smith et al.
1991). Foliar treatments with aqueous solutions
containing > 2% urea may lead to visible and physi-
ological symptoms associated with ammonia toxic-
ity (de Castro et al. 2022). Controlled release N fer-
tilizers have been proposed as a novel approach to
allow for application of higher amounts of foliar N,
where N is either encapsulated, coated, or present
in a nano composite (Zulfiqar et al. 2019). How-
ever, IFFCO recommends a mix of NU resulting
in a foliar spray containing a maximum of 0.035%
w/v urea (Raliya et al. 2021). This is far below the
observed limits of toxicity for conventional urea.
Thus, the benefits of applying highly processed urea
nanoparticles rather than dissolved urea as a foliar
spray appears puzzling, unless the scientific com-
munity is unaware of unknown positive side effects
of nano-sized materials stimulating plant growth.
Table 2 summarizes studies, claims, and rec-
ommendations associated with NU by IFFCO. It
becomes evident that there is a significant mismatch
between the control treatments used in field stud-
ies, the subsequent claims made, and the resulting
recommendations to farmers. In order to state yield
improvements in response to a specific form of fer-
tilizer application, the reference point must be clear
and well defined. IFFCO scientists did clearly not
meet this basic requirement.
The major field studies cited in Table 2 were con-
ducted in various regions in India for only one season
in winter 2019/2020 (Kumar et al. 2020a, b; Tiwari
et al. 2021). None of the studies shows basic physical
or chemical analyses of the soils, nor weather/climate
data. Most importantly, the N availability in the soils
was not investigated prior to the experiments. In order
to assess whether a fertilizer has a positive effect on
plant growth, it is essential to ensure that the yield
increase is caused by fertilizer application, and not for
instance by N mineralization from residual N stocks.
This is ensured by analyzing N uptake in a control
treatment not receiving N fertilizer (Hochmuth et al.
2022), which was not done here. In addition, the
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studies lack statistical analyses of the data; the experi-
mental set-ups are poorly described including the
location of the plots and the composition of the fer-
tilizers. It is remarkable that some text sections have
been copied from one publication to another (Kumar
et al. 2020a, b; Tiwari et al. 2021). Authors employed
at IFFCO do generally not state any conflicts of inter-
est (Kumar et al. 2020a, b, 2021b, c; Mishra et al.
2020; Tiwari et al. 2021).
Most recently, authors claimed that the application
of 75% of the recommended N dose (in the form of
conventional urea) to the soil plus two foliar sprays
of NU resulted in the same yield as applying the full
dose of 100% conventional urea to the soil. Based
on this, the authors conclude that a 25% reduction of
N usage is possible with NU. However, the conclu-
sion falls short in stating that the 75% N treatments
with and without NU resulted in the same yields in
six out of eight investigated seasons. Thus, according
to the results, NU could actually be omitted without
a reduction in yield. Yet again, the study does not
include a proper control treatment where foliar appli-
cation of NU was compared to foliar application of a
conventional N source (Upadhyay et al. 2023) mak-
ing it impossible to isolate the effects of the nano
approach.
The dry matter concentration of N in most crops
is 1–5% (de Bang et al. 2021). Thus, hypothesizing
that the 20 g N present in a bottle of NU was taken
up by the crop 100% efficiently, a bottle of NU would
provide sufficient N to grow a maximum of 0,4 – 2,0
kg plant material. A field with such a low biomass
productivity would fail to produce any significant
amounts of cereal grains. By contrast, a bag of con-
ventional urea containing 20,7 kg N would provide
enough N to grow 414,0 – 2070,0 kg of plant mate-
rial. This difference corresponds to a reduction in bio-
mass of more than 1000 fold.
The yield increase reported for NU might not be a
result of N fertilization, but rather of unknown growth
stimulating side effects that NPs may have, e.g. scav-
enging reactive oxygen species to reduce oxidative
damage and thereby increase plant stress tolerance
(Seleiman et al. 2021). However, none of the above-
mentioned explanations supports a stunning increase
in the NUE by more than 1000-fold. IFFCO is sell-
ing and promoting the product as a fertilizer, not as a
growth stimulant (Kumar 2021b; Babu et al. 2022a;
IFFCO 2022).
Plant Soil

Table 2  Summary of treatments from literature in relation to NU by IFFCO and what they mean in terms of fertilizing efficiency
compared to conventional fertilizers
Field trials referred to
Treatment Reducon of convenonal
in words soil ferlizaon (urea,
DAP) by half and replace-
ment by two foliar sprays
of 0,035 % NU containing
0,016 % N
(Kumar et al. 2020b, a,
2021c, b; Panda et al.
2020; Mishra et al. 2020;
Tiwari et al. 2021; Kumar
Midde et al. 2022;
Lekshmi et al. 2022; Goud
et al. 2022)
Treatment
illustrated
Reviews, popular out-
reach, and adver sement
A 45 kg bag of urea
(20,7 kg N) can be re-
placed by a single 500 ml
boŽle of NU containing 4
% N (20 g N)
(Kumar 2021b; Kumar et
al. 2021a; Baboo 2021;
Babu et al. 2022a; IFFCO
2022; Sharma et al. 2022;
Kantwa and Yadav 2022)
Recommenda on to farm-
ers
Farmers can replace a 45 kg
bag of foliar applied con-
venonal urea (20,7 kg N)
with a 500 ml boŽle of NU
(20 g N) applied in two
sprays of 0,035 % NU each,
while keeping the basal
ferlizaon constant.
(Kumar 2021b; Baboo 2021;
Kumar et al. 2021b; IFFCO
2022; Kantwa and Yadav
2022)

General- 8 % yield increase averaged over 94 crops in >10 000 field trials (Baboo 2021; Kumar
ized stated et al. 2021c, b; Kantwa and Yadav 2022)
result
What it With NU, a reducon of Generally, crops ulize N Top-dressed NU is at least
means soil applied urea usage by present in NU at least 1035 mes as efficient as a
> 50 % results in average 1035 mes as efficiently as ferlizer as top-dressed
yield increases of 8 %. convenonal urea applied convenonal urea.
to either soil or leaves.

Column 1: field trials that IFFCO scientists refer to; column 2: claims on the efficiency of NU from review articles, popular outreach
and advertisements; column 3: NU application recommendation for farmers. The illustrations in this table were made using the pro-
gram BioRender

In another study, conventional NPKS fertilizer
application was compared to application of organic
manure plus two sprays of NU (Kumar et al. 2022).
Both treatments occurred with the same estimated
amount of nutrients. The authors claim yield increases
of 24.24% (reported with two digits!) for sesame,
4.2% in pearl millet, and 8.4% in mustard, although
these effects appear not to be statistically significant.
Scientific reviews on the topic repeat claims made
by IFFCO since 2019, such as NU being taken up

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“80% more efficiently than conventional urea” (Babu
et al. 2022b). However, the authors refer to a publi-
cation about a chitosan-based nano NPK fertilizer
investigated for its efficiency on wheat grown in a
sandy soil in Egypt (Abdel-Aziz et al. 2016), three
years before NU entered the market (Kumar 2021b).
Another review repeats similar statements on high
efficiency and environmental compatibility of NU by
IFFCO (Sharma et al. 2022), but cites an article titled
“Current research on silver NPs: synthesis, charac-
terization, and applications” (Dawadi et al. 2021). A
review on the use of nanotechnology in sustainable
agriculture even describes a pathway of NU particle
translocation within plants including phloem trans-
location (Kumar et al. 2021c). However, there is not
one single reference to support this statement, and
to the best of our knowledge, no one has ever man-
aged to trace urea or urea based NP translocation
in the phloem. We generally observe that i) many
reviews made about nanotechnology in agriculture
make claims without providing proper scientific evi-
dence, and/or ii) cite unrelated references, and/or iii)
cite older reviews or statements made by companies
rather than referring back to the original literature
reference.
Do we know how Nano Urea interacts with plants?
IFFCO advertises NU as useful on a large variety of
plants, including “cereals, pulses, vegetable, fruits,
flowers, medicinal [eds. plants] and others” (IFFCO
2022). Independently of the crop concerned, two
sprays are recommended: 30–35 days after germina-
tion or 20–25 days after transplanting, and 20–25 days
after the first spray (Kumar 2021b; Babu et al. 2022a;
IFFCO 2022; Kantwa and Yadav 2022). However,
evidence suggests that uptake dynamics vary due to
leaf properties such as morphology, stomata location
and density, thickness and composition of the cuticu-
lar wax layer, and trichomes (Pérez-de-Luque 2017).
Therefore, the efficiency of foliar uptake of any sub-
stance is expected to vary across different crops and
growth stages. With respect to this evidence, there
must be a more efficient way to use a foliar fertilizer
than advising a one-fits-all recipe to farmers.
IFFCO reports enhanced photosynthesis and chlo-
rophyll contents (IFFCO 2022) and refers to (Jadhav
et al. 2022), where a Soil Plant Analysis Development
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(SPAD) study was conducted on NU sprayed maize.
However, the study does not state if the basal ferti-
lization had been reduced in the NU treatment, or
whether NU was added as a top-up. The authors do
not mention on which leaf position the measure-
ments were made, how old the plants were, or how
long after fertilizer application the analysis took
place (Jadhav et al. 2022), all of which are critical for
SPAD measurements (Kandel 2020). Among several
additional flaws, the study was conducted for only
one season and the conclusions are lacking statistical
backup (Jadhav et al. 2022).
According to some publications, NU adheres
to plant leaves and particles are taken up through
stomatal openings, hydathodes and other leaf open-
ings. Subsequently, particles are loaded into the
phloem, and can pass plasmodesmata connecting
individual cells. By binding to transport proteins,
NU can pass aquaporins and ion channels to enter
cells, or via endocytosis. NU can be stored in vac-
uoles until needed, and urea is released from the
particles in a controlled process (Babu et al. 2022a;
IFFCO 2022). It has indeed been shown that NPs
may be taken up by cells via endocytosis and can
be transported within the symplasm. However,
it has never been shown that untargeted NPs are
taken up by any transport proteins, including aqua-
porins and ion channels, as NPs are expected to be
excluded by e.g. size (Pérez-de-Luque 2017). Thus,
the uptake and transport pathway stated by IFFCO
remains purely speculative.
Lastly, IFFCO states that the product works effi-
ciently for soil applications (IFFCO 2022), but the
exact application is not specified on the web page or
elsewhere to our knowledge. By now, studies about
NU application on soils do not exist in the scientific
literature.
Is Nano Urea (liquid) non‑toxic
and environmentally friendly?
The environmental friendliness of NU plays
a major role in the promotion of the product
(Kumar 2021b). A closer inspection of the NU
website: “Production of IFFCO Nano Urea is
energy and resource friendly” and “It reduces
excess application of bulk urea and associated
volatilization as well as leaching and run off
Plant Soil
losses” (IFFCO 2022). Similar statements have
been adopted or generalized in various forms
in a variety of publications (e.g., Kumar et al.
2020b, 2021b; Babu et al. 2022a, b; Kantwa and
Yadav 2022). However, N utilized for producing
NU must originate from the Haber–Bosch pro-
cess alike N in any synthetic fertilizer. Accord-
ing to the patent application, the N source used
is urea (Raliya 2020, 2022) and any processing
(e.g. mixing, cooling, heating, transport) of urea
by IFFCO must increase the environmental foot-
print per unit of N applied, when compared to
bulk urea.
N losses by leaching through the soil column in
the form of N­ O3−, as well as N volatilization in the
form of ­NH3 to the atmosphere can lead to a vari-
ety of negative environmental impacts, as well as
economic losses for farmers (Stevens 1979). How-
ever, only the latter form of N loss from soils is a
major problem for the usage of bulk urea. There-
fore, urease inhibitors or fertilizer coatings are fre-
quently used nowadays in order to prevent N loss
to the atmosphere as ammonia (Klimczyk et al.
2021). It has been suggested that nanotechnology
can enhance nutrient uptake by plants, and reduce
their loss through leaching and volatilization (Iavi-
coli et al. 2017; Seleiman et al. 2021). However,
this has not been investigated for NU. The N field
balance for NU is not established, and the loss of
N per unit N applied remains to be elucidated.
One could assume lower environmental impacts
of NU due to its supposedly high efficiency and
lower necessity for N application. However, as
discussed above, these claims are not sufficiently
documented.
As stated by IFFCO, NU was tested for bio-
toxicity according to the “Guidelines for Evalua-
tion of Nano-Based-Agri-Input & Food products
in India 2020” released by the Department of Bio-
technology, government of India (IFFCO 2022).
IFFCO provides a product safety assessment sheet
meant to document the non-toxicity and biosafety
of the product to a variety of organisms, as well
as soil and water quality in line with several inter-
national guidelines (Kumar et al. 2021b; IFFCO
2022). However, the sources do neither contain
information about the laboratories in charge for
the testing, nor about the procedures used for the
tests, nor about detailed test results. Risks attached
to nanofertilizers and the procedures necessary to
ensure their safe use have been pointed out in detail
(Iavicoli et al. 2017). We must assume that such
safety measures have either not been met by IFFCO,
or the test results have not been published transpar-
ently to the public.
Do farmers and societies benefit financially
from Nano Urea (liquid)?
The price of NU has been set strategically 10%
below the price of a bag of conventional urea on the
Indian market (Kumar 2021b; Kumar et al. 2021a;
date at 225 ₹ (Indian Rs.) (IFFCO 2022). While
Baboo 2021; Kantwa and Yadav 2022) and is to
conventional urea is subsidized by the Indian gov-
ernment (Kishore et al. 2021), NU is excluded from
the subsidies (Kumar et al. 2021a; Baboo 2021;
Press Trust of India Ltd. 2023b). Potentially, this
allows the Indian government to save money when
conventional urea is replaced by NU (Kumar et al.
2021c; Press Trust of India Ltd. 2023b). Per unit of
times the price of conventional urea (225 ₹ for 0,02
N sold to Indian farmers, NU is approximately 1000
kg N versus 242 ₹ for 20.7 kg N) (Kumar 2021b;
IFFCO 2022). Therefore, farmers save expenses
only as long as the efficiency of the product as a fer-
tilizer has been proven to be at least 1045 times as
high as for conventional urea. As discussed above,
this is currently far from being proven. Some stud-
ies present increases in the economic returns of
farmers per land unit cultivated under application of
NU, but the basis for the calculations (e.g. market
prices) were not specified and therefore impossi-
ble to elucidate (e.g., Kumar et al. 2020a, b; Tiwari
et al. 2021).
The price of NU has already enforced a socio-
economic crisis: Sri Lanka has been suffering from
a severe economic crisis since 2020, which brought
the government to reduce expenses spent on synthetic
fertilizers by rashly shifting to organic agriculture in
2021 (Wipulasena and Mashal 2021; Torrella 2022).
In combination with high fuel prices, this has lead
to large scale yield losses and rising food insecurity
since 2022 (UN/OCHA 2023), culminating in riots
calmed only by military forces and the president flee-
ing from the country (Mashal 2022). Remarkably, the
Sri Lankan government had purchased Nano Nitrogen
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by IFFCO in the course of the crisis in 2021 at a price
4 times as high as on the Indian market (Nilar 2022).
Later, it turned out that the purchased Nano Nitrogen
was in fact NU (Kumar 2021a; Ileperuma 2021). In
2022, these procedures were questioned by the politi-
cal opposition in an audit report and required the Sri
Lankan minister of external affairs to resolve the disa-
greements with India (Nilar 2022).
What is the way forward?
Based on the above, it seems necessary and acute
that independent bodies conduct scientific research
on whether NU has a positive impact on plant growth
and to which extent. Its functional properties at
plant physiological level (i.e. uptake and assimila-
tion mechanisms), and assessments of environmental
risks, toxicity, and life cycle assessments (LCA) must
be performed and made available to the public. We
propose to follow the framework listed below to prove
that the nanofertilizer has the positive yield responses
expected. Secondly, we refer to (Pérez-de-Luque
2017; Seleiman et al. 2021; Husted et al. 2023), as
these publications describe which details must be
known in order to understand uptake and assimila-
tion of NPs as fertilizers at the mechanistic level.
Thirdly, potential environmental risks associated with
the agricultural use of NPs are reported in literature,
and frameworks are provided in order to assess them
properly (Iavicoli et al. 2017; de Oliveira Pereira
et al. 2020). These guidelines should be followed, and
results should be transparent to the public. In addi-
tion, LCAs may allow to justify claims on environ-
mental friendliness of a product (Hasler et al. 2015).
Based on authoritative publications (Karamanos
et al. 2014; Davis et al. 2017; Hochmuth et al. 2022),
we selected four central criteria that must be met in
order to document the superiority of nano based N
fertilizers in the field:
1. The field study must be conducted on an N
responsive soil
The plant-availability of soil-derived N during the
experimental period must be sufficiently low to
induce deficiency and a yield response if ferti-
lized. Preferably several levels of N additions
should be used in order to reflect the yield-
response curve for N at the experimental site.
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Plant Soil
2. Choose control treatments that fit the conclusions
to be drawn
It is essential to set and state a clear reference point
(control treatment) to which the treatment is
superior or mediocre to. In field testings, the con-
trol treatments are typically a plot not receiving
N fertilizer and a plot reflecting best practice fer-
tilization for a given crop cultivated on a specific
soil type and location.
3. Describe materials and methods properly
Materials and methods for field trials must contain
proper information about which products (includ-
ing detailed description of NP composition) were
applied to a specific crop cultivar.
4. Make an adequate amount of randomized repeti-
tions and apply statistics
When drawing quantitative information from a field
trial, it is necessary to design the experiment in
a way that allows proper statistical evaluation
of the obtained results. Therefore, an adequate
amount of randomized repetitions (typically n>3)
for each treatment and control are necessary. The
experiment should span several years, and a wide
range of soils and growing conditions. Statistical
tests must be reported to ensure that the observed
effects are indeed: i) significantly different, ii)
reproducible over time and between seasons, and
iii) excluding type I errors expected in nature.
Conclusion
NU is a novel N fertilizer recently marketed by India’s
largest fertilizer manufacturer (IFFCO) in a way that
suggests its effect and sustainability have been sci-
entifically proven. We challenge this presentation by
questioning and comparing the claims with the exist-
ing scientific literature from well-reputed journals. We
conclude, that NU is a scarcely characterized product
with no or poor scientifically proven effects. The prod-
uct is promoted with misleading and wrong statements
about its efficiency as a fertilizer, plant uptake path-
ways, and environmental friendliness. With the doubts
about the effect of NU in mind, the price of the product
seems excessively high. Reported economic benefits
for farmers applying NU suffer from the absence of a
solid basis for the calculations. We do not stand alone
with these doubts (Saklani et al. 2022), and some criti-
cal voices have recently been raised in India as well,
Plant Soil
i.e. by N.K. Tomar (retired professor of soil science
at CCS Haryana Agricultural University, India). As
IFFCO aims at an expansive and large scale produc-
tion, there are several serious risks associated to these
commercial ambitions: Large scale yield and economic
losses to farmers, food insecurity, environmental risks,
social disruption and conflicts. Politics and commercial
incentives might interfere with the independence of the
scientists involved. We acknowledge the great benefit
that nanofertilizers potentially may have, but seriously
doubt the positive impact of NU for farmers, societies
and the environment as it stands right now. We empha-
size that independent bodies should follow a consistent
framework to verify whether novel fertilizer products
have indeed beneficial effects for crop growth and yield
prior to marketing and applying them widely. Finally,
it appears that peer review of many papers within the
area of nanofertilization is of insufficient quality as
the fundamental lacks described above should prevent
publication in any well reputed scientific journals.
Funding Open access funding provided by Royal Library,
Copenhagen University Library
Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Com-
mons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits
use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any
medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the
original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Crea-
tive Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The
images or other third party material in this article are included
in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated
otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not
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intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds
the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly
from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
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