The use of straight urea in any form other than liquid urea is to be banned from use on Irish farms at the end of the 2025 application period for chemical fertilisers.

It will be illegal for farmers to use urea products such as granular urea from 2025, meaning any existing stocks must be used before the prohibited application period commences on 15 September 2025.

The ban introduced as part of the midterm review of Ireland’s fifth Nitrates Action Plan (NAP) will mean significant changes in terms of fertiliser use and increased costs with protected urea products typically costing €40/t to €50/t more than comparable unprotected urea fertilisers.

Industry estimates show that almost 80,000t of unprotected urea was purchased by farmers in 2024 with an equivalent volume of protected urea traded.

In the region of an additional 40,000t of unprotected urea blend with sulphur, phosphorus or potassium was bought by farmers.

Fertiliser database

The purchase of all fertiliser and lime sold in Ireland is now tracked on the National Fertiliser Database since 2023. Farmers are required by law to maintain a record of fertiliser use for the year on the database. This is completed by farmers declaring closing stocks of fertiliser.

Any existing stocks of unprotected urea must be used before 15 September 2025. / Donal O'Leary

Any purchase of fertiliser in Ireland is recorded on the database at the point of sale. Farmers are required by law to declare closing stocks of fertiliser, with the difference in volumes purchased and remaining unused volumes on farms on 15 September, taken as the volume used for the year.

This is the details that Department inspectors now work off in the case of an inspection when cross-referencing fertiliser use with a farm’s chemical fertiliser allowances.

Farmers are required by law to complete the declaration and still submit a ‘nil declaration’ even where there is no fertiliser remaining on farm.

This must be completed by 15 October annually.

Completing the declaration

The declaration must be completed online via the agfood.ie portal by a farmer or a Farm Advisory System (FAS) adviser approved to act on the farmers behalf. The process is relatively straightforward as follows;

  • When logged on to the homepage scroll down to the heading ‘National Fertiliser Database’ and select this tab. On the next webpage there is a heading Actions and a ‘+’ symbol where a farmer has not previously registered.
  • To register click on the symbol and this will generate a pop-up screen asking you to confirm that you agree to register as a professional user. This is completed by ticking the box in the left corner. You will be asked that you confirm registration and that is the end of the registration process. Where registration is successful the ‘+’ symbol will be replaced by three dots.
  • To record closing stocks click on the three dots and this will present a number of options including recording the closing stocks. Click on ‘closing stocks’ and then click on the option to declare stocks, followed by pressing the green button which pops up saying ‘declare closing stocks’.

    • Accessing previous data

    Protected urea will be the only source of urea fertiliser available to farmers after 2025. \ Donal O'Leary

    The database can also be used as a useful tool to keep an accurate account on the volume of fertiliser used. It can be accessed as follows;

  • When logged in to the database click on the three dots under actions.
  • Select the first option – fertiliser received.
  • This will bring up a record of all fertiliser and lime purchases and the dates of such
  • The information is particularly useful when completing fertiliser records for derogation submissions or in completing the Bord Bia producer survey in advance of an audit.