Fertigation

Fertigation and Fertilizer Application

Fertigation requires a thorough understanding of the science behind the technology to make it deliver the immense possibility it offers in crop production. Though the idea of fertigation existed from the times of solution culture, it did not receive the necessary attention from among plant nutritionists and agronomists when it reappeared in the context of micro irrigation.

Fertilizer application in field agriculture has also not developed as a precision technology. Recommendations of the quantum of fertilizers required for a crop, at least in India, are not based on current varieties of the crops, nor have they anything to do with the growth rate and developmental changes occurring while a crop is managed by the grower. Most of the fertilizer recommendations are itself very old and efforts to make them relevant to the current growing conditions, soil status, crop variety, and crops' reaction to the environment, etc., are very limited.

It is even worse when growers follow traders’ recommendations whose idea is to sell more of the fertilizer they supply. Not only are lower yields and very low fertilizer use efficiencies the results, but the deterioration of soil and water bodies is also a consequence.

Note

T&F does not sell or distribute the hardback in India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka. This title is co-published with NIPA.