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PLANT NUTRITION & FERTILIZATION

It is remarkable to consider that, with the exception of certain microbes, plants are the only net producers in our biological system. As they grow, they fix the energy and synthesise all the building blocks humans and animals need for life. In this basic fixation of light energy, the green plant uses just carbon dioxide and water as ingredients to produce sugar – a process known as photosynthesis.

However, at least thirteen more chemical elements, so-called nutrients, are indispensable to all plants to enable them to construct themselves and to function: to germinate, grow, photosynthesise and be fertile. 
Macro-nutrients (nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium) are the main constituents of the plant’s tissues and essential components in its metabolism:
  • Nitrogen primarily contributes to fuel the plant growth
  • Phosphorus promotes root growth, improves the quality of the grain and accelerates its ripening
  • Potassium helps plants resist hardiness, water stress, pests and diseases
Secondary and micro-nutrients (sulphur, calcium, magnesium, iron, copper, boron, zinc or manganese) are essential for the plant’s physiology.
 
The plant will normally obtain these elements from the soil through its roots. With agricultural systems where no external nutrients (organic or inorganic) are supplied to the soil, crop yield is determined by natural soil fertility, which tends to decrease after each harvest: if there is not enough of any one of these elements the metabolism of a plant will break down at a certain point of development and healthy growth, normal yield and good quality are no longer possible.
 
In modern agriculture, soil fertility must be maintained at a high level in order to maximise the land's productive capacity. Therefore, those nutrients taken up by the plants, and then removed with the harvest, must be replenished.
 
Nutrients are obtained from the soil and its minerals. These nutrients can be organic, deriving from crop residues or manures, or inorganic, namely mineral nutrients. A soil deficiency of a certain nutrient can be compensated by applying an organic or inorganic fertilizer.
 
EFMA promotes the correct use of both manures and fertilizers as Good Agricultural Practices. As the supplies of nutrients by manure and organics are usually inadequate to continually meet the nutrient requirements of all crops, mineral fertilizers have to be used to make up the deficit.
 
Fertilizer recommendations are designed to provide different nutrients in correct proportions, according to crop need. A deficiency of any nutrient is not only, in itself, detrimental to the plant, but it also affects the plant’s ability to use the other nutrients effectively.

 

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