Indian agriculture has long remained the backbone of the national economy, sustaining nearly half of the country’s population while ensuring food security for over 1.4 billion people. Over the past decades, this sector has undergone a constructive transformation, steadily moving from subsistence dependence to a more resilient, technology-enabled, market-connected, and sustainability-oriented system. Policy initiatives promoting soil health management, balanced fertiliser use, digital extension platforms, and organised farmer groups have strengthened the sector’s foundations, while cooperative institutions have played a pivotal role in operationalising policy reforms at the grassroots level.
Among India’s key cooperative institutions, the Indian Farmers Fertiliser Cooperative Limited (IFFCO) has emerged as a central pillar of the country’s agrarian strength, standing today as one of the world’s largest cooperatives and India’s biggest fertiliser cooperative. Established in 1967 as an organisation owned by farmers and run for farmers, IFFCO was created to ensure the timely supply of quality fertilisers at affordable prices while protecting cultivators from market volatility and monopolistic pressures. Serving over five crore farmers through more than 35,600 member cooperative societies, IFFCO has steadily expanded its role beyond fertiliser manufacturing into seed development, rural credit facilitation, extension services, and agri-input distribution, with a cooperative ethos that blends economic efficiency with social responsibility shaping its institutional character and sustained growth. Over the last five years, particularly since Dilip Sanghani assumed the chairmanship in January 2022, IFFCO has entered a phase of consolidation and forward-looking transformation marked by continuity, institutional discipline, and measured innovation. Drawing on decades of experience in the cooperative movement, he has served as a multi-portfolio minister in the Gujarat Government, handling Agriculture, Cooperation, Animal Husbandry, Fisheries, and Cow Breeding. Sanghani has steered IFFCO with a pragmatic, consensus-driven leadership style that strengthens its core farmer-centric mandate while preparing it for emerging challenges in Indian agriculture. During this period, IFFCO’s financial performance has remained consistently strong despite global fertiliser market volatility driven by energy prices, geopolitical disruptions, and supply-chain stress. In the financial year 2024–25, IFFCO recorded a turnover of ₹41,244 crore and a profit before tax of ₹3,811 crore, marking the third consecutive year in which profits exceeded ₹3,000 crore. Net profit stood at ₹2,823 crore, representing a 16 per cent year-on-year increase. These figures reflect not aggressive expansion, but steady operational efficiency and prudent financial management. Production and distribution metrics also underline this stability. In FY 2024–25, IFFCO produced 93.10 lakh metric tonnes of fertilisers and related products across its manufacturing units, while total sales reached 113.78 lakh metric tonnes.
These numbers matter in a country where timely fertiliser availability directly affects crop planning and farm incomes. The most consequential shift under Sanghani’s chairmanship, however, has been IFFCO’s strategic emphasis on technology, particularly nano fertilisers. Traditional fertiliser use in India has long suffered from inefficiencies, over-application, and environmental stress. Nano fertilisers aim to address these issues by delivering nutrients more precisely and in much smaller quantities. In FY 2024–25, sales of nano fertilisers reached 365.09 lakh bottles, up sharply from the previous year. Nano Urea Plus (liquid) recorded a 31 per cent increase in sales, while Nano
DAP (liquid)saw a 118 per cent jump. These figures suggest growing farmer acceptance, driven not only by policy support but by field-level validation through cooperative networks. IFFCO’s Model Nano Village and Cluster Project further demonstrated this approach. Covering more than 200 clusters and nearly 90,000 farmers, the initiative reported reductions of close to 29 per cent in chemical fertiliser use and yield improvements of over 5 per cent in pilot areas. In sum, IFFCO over period has turned into a model cooperative institution that secures India’s agrarian future by empowering farmers through a blend of cooperative tradition, innovation, and sustainable growth.
By Rakesh Singh
Managing Editor, ITV Network