Chief minister K Rosaiah on Thursday made a plea to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to help the state in getting an allocation of 3 million standard cubic feet per day (MMSCMD) of gas in the first phase, and another 3 MMSCMD of gas in the second phase for the Indian Farmers fertilizer cooperative (IFFCO) plant coming up near Krishnapatnam Port in Nellore district.

In a letter to prime minister, Rosaiah said that the IFFCO had come forward to invest Rs 10,000 crore and build a 2.6-million tonne capacity urea plant in the state. IFFCO is the world’s largest fertilizer cooperative with a domestic production capacity of 42.5 lakh MTPA.

Rosaiah said about 2,700 acres of land near Krishnapatnam port has been acquired to set up ammonia-urea plant in 1997 but the manufacturing facility could not materialise so far due to shortage in supply of natural gas. Once the gas is allocated, IFFCO would invest Rs 10,000 crore and the plant would be ready by 2013-14, he said. This plant will benefit the farmers of Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka in meeting the high demand of ammonia-urea.

The chief minister further said that a major pipeline from KG Basin would be passing along NH-5, close to the IFFCO’s existing Nellore site. The pipeline being laid by Reliance Industries Ltd is scheduled to be completed by 2012.

Tags:IFFCO, krishnapatnam, Nellore, NH 5, power plant