Mumbai, Feb. 23 -- The Central Government has facilitated mutually agreed price of Potassium Derived from Molasses (PDM) at Rs 4263/MT for sale by sugar mills to fertilizer companies for the current year. In addition, PDM Manufacturers can also claim subsidy at Rs. 345/Ton at present rates under Nutrients Based Subsidy Scheme (NBS) of Department of Fertilizers. Now, both, sugar mills and fertilizer companies are discussing modalities to enter into long-term sale/purchase agreement on PDM.

PDM, a potassium rich fertilizer derived from ash in molasses based distilleries is a by-product of sugar based ethanol industry. These distilleries produce a waste chemical called spent wash during production of ethanol which is burnt in Incineration B...