Next Steps in the Development of Biodegradable Coating

Innovation has always been at the heart of Osmocote. For decades, Osmocote controlled-release fertilizers have helped growers achieve predictable nutrient delivery, high nutrient use efficiency and consistent crop performance. Today, that innovation journey continues with the development of the future biodegradable coating for Osmocote.

Following years of intensive research, ICL has reached several important milestones:

• the new coating technology has been successfully certified*
• large production runs for commercial testing have been completed
• extensive scientific and grower are now underway across Europe.
• new prototypes in the pipeline

The objective is not simply to develop a biodegradable coating. The challenge is to combine everything growers expect from Osmocote, including long-lasting longevity, controlled nutrient release and consistent crop performance, with an innovative coating technology designed for the future, granting full biodegradability.

Combining longevity and biodegradability is one of the key challenges in this project. It means to combine long-lasting, controlled nutrient release with rapid biodegradation once nutrients have been released. This requires a completely new technological approach.

“The biggest challenge is combining longevity and biodegradability. You need a coating that remains stable during the crop cycle and releases nutrients in a controlled way, and then biodegrades quickly after that release period has ended. These are two properties that do not naturally go together”

says Gerard Klein Onstenk, ICL’s International Marketing Manager for Ornamental Horticulture. It is exactly here that the long-time expertise of ICL’s CRF scientists working in one of its 150 R&D laboratories comes to play.

Achieving certification marks an important step in demonstrating that the technology will meet future legislative requirements. At the same time, successful large-scale production runs have confirmed that the coating can be manufactured beyond the development stage, paving the way for broader market introduction, although the process of scaling up is challenging.

Scaling Up for the Future

To validate performance under commercial growing conditions, ICL is conducting trials across different climate zones, crops, substrates, application ways and irrigation systems. Testing is taking place at both research stations and commercial nurseries, generating valuable insights throughout complete crop cycles. In 2026 180 trials are running in 12 countries.

Results achieved so far have shown consistent growth and stable plant development, giving confidence that the new coating technology can deliver the performance growers expect fromOsmocote.

Over the coming months, ICL will continue expanding practical grower trials and increasing production volumes as the industry moves towards the 2028 legislative deadline. Through close collaboration with growers, ICL aims to support a smooth transition to the next generation of controlled release fertilisers, while confirming the same plants quality

*CerTrust on June 2025  as “in compliance with the relevant essential requirements of 2019/1009 Regulation”.