ABSTRACT

In sub-Saharan Africa, soil fertility depletion and limited access to mineral phosphorus (P) fertilizers are considered among the main constraints of crop productivity. The goal of our work is to make P fertilizer from locally available materials, thus reducing the costs due to importation and transportation for smallholder-farmers with limited financial capacities. Cattle bones collected from slaughterhouses were ground to two fineness-level, acidified using coffee wastewater (pH ~4.3), and then compared to commercially available diammonium phosphate (DAP) in a pot experiment using Zea mays (maize) and Phaseolus vulgaris (common bean). Finely ground bones increased maize and common bean dry matter yield (DMY) and P uptake compared to coarsely ground bones, but a significant interaction between grinding and acidification also suggests that acidification with coffee wastewater increased availability of bone-based P, at least two-times more DMY and P uptake under acidified finely ground bones than for non-acidified treatments. In addition, acidified finely-ground bones produced maize and common bean DMY, P uptake and P recovery efficiency that were comparable to those of DAP. These results demonstrate the utility of acidified finely ground bones to enhance crop yields, potentially serving as an alternative P-rich resource to imported and expensive fertilizers that depend on nonrenewable resources.

摘要

在撒哈拉以南非洲地区，土壤肥力枯竭和矿物质磷（P）肥料的获取受到限制是作物生产力的主要制约因素之一。我们工作的目标是用当地可得的材料制造磷肥，从而降低财务能力有限的小农户因进口和运输而产生的成本。从屠宰场收集的牛骨被研磨至两个细度级别，使用咖啡废水（pH〜4.3）酸化，然后在使用玉米（Zea mays）（玉米）和菜豆（Phaseolus vulgaris）的盆栽实验中与市售的磷酸氢二铵（DAP）进行比较（普通豆）。与粗磨的骨头相比，细磨的骨头增加了玉米和普通豆干物质产量（DMY）和磷的吸收，但是磨碎和酸化之间的显着相互作用还表明，用咖啡废水酸化可以增加基于骨的P的利用率，至少有两个在酸化的细磨骨骼下的DMY和P吸收量是未酸化的处理量的2倍。此外，酸化的细磨骨产生的玉米和普通豆的DMY，P吸收和P回收效率与DAP相当。这些结果证明了使用酸化的细磨的骨骼来提高农作物的产量，有可能作为依赖不可再生资源的进口和昂贵肥料的富磷替代资源。