Potential of Bio-Based Phosphorus Fertilisers to replace conventional fertilizers in Europe

Summary in the original language of the document

Phosphorus (P) is an essential plant nutrient, and mineable P deposits for production of inorganic P fertilisers are finite. Substituting conventional inorganic fertilisers with novel bio-based fertilisers (BBFs) produced from various organic wastes and side streams promotes the circular economy, but the BBFs need to be effective and reliable. Our objectives were i) to evaluate the P fertilisation effect of current and emerging BBFs using pot and field experiments, and ii) to assess the P demand in Europe based on soil P test values. To this end, i) 30 P-BBFs either commercially available or at a high developmental stage were tested in three pot trials conducted under different conditions, and a subset of eight fertilisers was also evaluated at five field sites across Europe, and ii) a prediction of Olsen P threshold values was developed in order to identify P-responsive agricultural soils of the European Union and to estimate the potential of P-BBFs to replace conventional inorganic fertilisers.