Abstract. Slow-release fertilizers (SRFs) are developed, to halt the nutrient loss to the environment, either by coating the urea or by infusing the urea in a hydrophobic material. SRFs reduces the nutrient release to that point where a single application of fertilizer can meet the nutrient demand of the plants. Diverse range of materials have already been utilized to produce SRFs, however several disadvantages such hydrophilicity, non-biodegradability and crystallinity limit their scale up. Herein, we reported the production of coating of urea using chicken manure with paraffin wax as a binder. Nitrogen release test of the coated urea revealed that only 11.8% of total nutrients were released in first 12 h whereas uncoated urea released ≥99.9 % nutrients. Ritger-Peppas model was found to best fit the nutrient release kinetic data with an R2 value of 0.97.
