Field validation of Nutrient Expert Soybean in China
Nutrient Expert Soybean was developed to evaluate and validate fertilizer recommendation method based yield response and agronomic efficiency as compared with soil testing and farmer's practice.
IPNI-2014-CHN-NES
25 Mar 2015
2014 Annual Interpretive Summary
This study was conducted to validate the Nutrient Expert(R) (NE)-based fertilizer recommendation for soybean in farmer fields and compare it against farmer fertilization practice (FP) and soil test-based fertilizer recommendation. 2014 was the first year for NE Soybean field validation. The study had 12 field validation experiments in Heilongjiang. Each individual site had a site-specific recommendation, the NE-based plots received an average of 52 kg N, 52 kg P2O5 and 57 kg K2O/ha; FP plots received an average of 47 kg N, 63 kg P2O5 and 38 K2O/ha; and soil test plots received an average of 51 kg N, 63 kg P2O5 and 56 K2O/ha.
The NE plots produced an average grain yield of 2,859 kg/ha and US$1,989/ha of profit. These yields were 13% and 5% higher than FP and soil-test plots, respectively. Similarly, profits were 7% and 2% higher under NE when compared against FP and soil test plots.
NE Soybean is already a promising fertilizer recommendation method when soil test recommendations are not available or timely.