Balanced Fertilization of Major Crops in Egypt

The objectives of this project are to determine the effect of balanced fertilization on the yield of major crops in the common cropping systems of Egypt and extend to farmers the most efficient fertilization and irrigation techniques. For this, field experiments were conducted at two locations with seven treatments, viz., no fertilizer, NPK according to the farmer's practice, NP at the recommended rate, NK as recommended by the Egyptian Ministry of Agriculture (MOA), NPK as recommended by MOAt, NPK based on soil testing, and NPK based on soil testing + micronutrients (balanced fertilization treatment).
For all crops and locations, balanced fertilization helped maximize yield and yield components. At the El-Behira site, wheat grain yield was highest (6.6 t/ha) in the NPK+micronutrients treatment plot, whereas control and the farmers' practice treatments resulted in lowest yields (2.3 and 4.2 t/ha, respectively). A similar trend was observed with the maize crop, where the highest grain yield (8 t/ha) was obtained in the NPK+micronutrients treatment plot, while control and farmers' practice treatments yielded the lowest (2.6 and 3.2 t/ha, respectively). Similarly, at the El-Monofia site, wheat grain yield was highest (6.5 t/ha) for the NPK+micronutrients treatment, while control and farmers' practice treatments resulted in lowest yields (5.1 and 5.3 t/ha, respectively). Consistently, the maize crop recorded highest yield (13.2 ton/ha) with NPK+micronutrients treatment, while control and farmers' practice treatments had grain yields of 8.5 and 9.7 t/ha, respectively.