How Farmers in Africa are Using Phosphorus to Fertilize Their Soil

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How Farmers in Africa are Using Phosphorus to Fertilize Their Soil

Some are calling it "the miracle mineral" the world needs.

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Representative Image Source: Pixabay, labeled for reuse

With support from the European Journalism Centre (EJC) and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation,  Sibylle Grunge and Kerstin Hoppenhaus recently published an article for BBC about the low-cost ways to improve poor Africanican soils and reduce dependency on mineral fertilisers.

For African farmers, phosphorus is particularly important because it affects the plant early in its life, and is, thus, crucial for the proper root development. Yet, phosphorus reserves are not spread out equally across the continent. In a small country like Malawi which largely depends on imports, this might come as a big problem. Another problematic thing is that the fertilizer needs to be bought early in the season, which is not always possible due to the cost.

"To help farmers access fertilizer, the Malawian government launched a comprehensive subsidy programme in 2005. Coinciding with favorable weather, it brought some improvement in its first years. But over time, yields have stagnated", states the article. "The solution to Malawi's phosphorus problems, it turns out, requires more than just pouring mineral fertilizer onto the land."

Another thing to consider is the fact that the soils in Malawi (and other sub-Saharan countries in Africa) are acidic which is why most phosphate ions quickly bind with iron or aluminum oxides and are no longer available for plants. So, even with a large phosphorus reserve, much of it is practically useless for agriculture. This is a reason why, before mineral fertilizers can be fully effective, the structure of the soils needs to change.

To learn more about this subject, please visit BBC Future.

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