State-owned Chittagong Urea Fertilizer Limited at Anwara in Chattogram has suspended its urea production following a halt to gas supply Friday morning by the Karnaphuli Gas Distribution Limited despite having no supply shortage.
The suspension effective from 6:00am brought urea production at the CUFL, a subsidiary of the Bangladesh Chemical Industries Corporation, to a complete halt, causing an estimated daily production loss of fertiliser worth Tk聽3 crore, according to factory officials.
CUFL managing director Mizanur Rahman said, 鈥楪as supply to the factory was suddenly stopped this morning, halting production. This shutdown will result in a significant daily loss of fertiliser output worth about Tk聽3 crore.鈥�
He added that the company had not been informed about the reason for the gas supply suspension.
While the gas supply to the CUFL was halted, operations at the Karnaphuli Fertilizer Company Limited, a fertiliser plant with foreign investment in the same region, remained uninterrupted.
KGDCL general manager (engineering) Aminur Rahman said that the gas supply was halted on the BCIC instruction.
鈥楾he gas supply to the CUFL was not stopped due to a shortage. We acted on the BCIC directive. Supply will resume once we receive fresh instructions in this regard,鈥� he said.
The CUFL receives 40 million cubic feet of gas a day from the KGDCL for its urea production, while KAFCO is allocated between 42 to 43 million cubic feet.
On October 29, 1987, the government established the fertiliser factory at Rangadia of Anwara upazila, on the southern bank of the River Karnaphuli, with technical assistance from Japan.
At the time of its inauguration, the factory had a daily urea production capacity of 1,700 tonnes and an annual capacity of 5,61,000 tonnes, but currently it is capable of producing 1,200 tonnes of urea daily. Additionally, the CUFL can produce 3,10,000 tonnes of ammonia annually.
Bangladesh鈥檚 annual urea fertiliser demand is about 27 lakh tonnes. About 10 lakh tonnes are produced locally with the CUFL accounting for one lakh tonnes of the domestic production.
Urea fertiliser consumption reaches its peak between December and February in the country. The consumption of the fertiliser reaches its second highest level between March and May with about a fourth of the overall consumption taking place in the period, according to the BCIC.
