42 years of studies, and Nepal still has no urea plant

Every monsoon, the same story returns to Nepal’s Terai. Farmers queue at cooperatives that have run short of urea, and the government turns once more to India. This year was no different: in early May, Nepal arranged to import 60,000 tonnes of urea and 20,000 tonnes of DAP from its southern neighbour under a 2022 government-to-government deal, short of the 150,000 tonnes it had originally requested.

On the other side of the same economy, something quieter was unfolding. The Nepal Electricity Authority recorded a system peak of 2,901 megawatts on July 1, 2025, with 687 MW exported to India. During the 2025 wet season, the independent power producers’ association reported , surplus generation reached about 1,400 MW against an Indian export approval of 1,141 MW, and the rest was spilt, unused. The surplus will only grow: the new budget plans to add 670 MW of hydropower and 370 MW of solar to the grid in the coming year.