Status quo of fertilization strategies and nutrient farm gate budgets on stockless organic vegetable farms in Germany

Abstract

Fertilizer management in stockless organic vegetable production is strongly affected by external nutrient purchases due to the high nitrogen (N) and potassium (K) requirements of vegetables. However, the database on nutrient flows and budgets in organic vegetable farming in Europe is very limited. Therefore, a survey based on semi-structured interviews was carried out comprising 12 organic horticultural farms in Germany. The results show that three different main fertilizer categories are used as inputs in different ratios by the inventoried farms: (1) base fertilizers (e.g., composts, solid farmyard manures), (2) commercial organic N fertilizers (e.g., keratins or plant products from food production or fermentation processes), and (3) commercial mineral fertilizers (e.g., potassium sulfate), all of which are approved for organic production. Ninety percent of the total nutrient inputs to the farms came from these fertilizers and biological N2 fixation, with the remaining 10% coming from other inputs, such as seeds or growing media. The estimated yearly average total farm budgets were nearly balanced across all farms with moderate surpluses (67.5 kg N ha−1, 2.06 kg P ha−1, and 0.26 kg K ha−1). However, large imbalances were found for most of the individual farms. These imbalances indicate the risk of nutrient accumulation or nutrient depletion in the soil, depending on the fertilization strategy and productivity of the farm. More specifically, increasing N share from base fertilizers led to increased P and K budgets, while strategies based on the use of large amounts of keratins led to the opposite—K and P depletion. We concluded that balanced nutrient management in organic vegetable production systems requires a thorough calculation and should combine the use of base fertilizers, commercial fertilizers with low P content, and increased N supply via BNF.