Nutrient Management Strategies for Yunnan
IPNI-1999-CHN-YN13
17 Feb 2006
Background and Objectives
- Background: Songmin and Qujin in Yunnan are the main agricultural bases where both value commercial cash crops and food crops grow. However, fertilization in Songmin and Qujin were mainly depended on farmer’s experiences in the past. The farmer’s experiences were limited by their farming knowledge and their education background. Most of the farmers do not really have the knowledge to properly manage their crop fields. The purpose of NMS program was to introduce the scientific nutrient management to the farmers in Songmin and Qujin.
Objectives: (1) To study the relationship among fertilization, crop uptake, soil nutrient balance and nutrient utilization percent;(2) to evaluate the effect of nutrient rates on crop growth and to determine the optimum rates of nutrient fertilizer for higher yield; (3)to find out optimum rates of nutrient fertilizer which make the maximum fertilizer utilization ratio; and (4)to find out the possible limiting factors for the experimental sites.
Implementation: Two field trials for rice and broadbean were set up at Xiadianxin Village in Songmin and another two for tobacco and wheat at Xintian Village in Qujing. A proper fertilizer program was developed based on soil test and local recommendations. Nitrogen, P, K and other limiting nutrients like Ca, Zn, Mg according to soil testing were considered to achieve best growth of each crop. However, no response to micro-nutrients was observed in 2004 after 3 year’s application in the experiments and hence, its application was eliminated in 2005. To optimize utilization of nutrients, different rates of N, P and K application were used in these experiments. These experiments were undertaken as a randomized block design with four replicates and followed the plot layout of previous crops definitely.