Heavy metals in mineral fertilizers :
What impact on soil / plant transfer?
What impact on the environment?
Do we have a clear vision of these impacts during several years of intensive cultivation practice in some advanced countries ?.
This report - although being in dutch - might be of some help.
Technical Report Blootstelling en opname van cadmium door runderen in de Kemp...
Concentrations of Heavy Metals in NPK Fertilizers Imported in Serbia (Pestic. fitomed. (Beograd), 23 (2008) 195-200 UDC: 631.8:543.632.495(497.11).
Pestic. Phytomed. (Belgrade), 23 (2008) 195-200)
SUMMARY : Concentrations of Pb, Cd, Cu and Mn in sixteen NPK fertilizers imported and widely used in Serbia were determined by flame atomic absorption spectrometry (AAS). The results show that contents of heavy metals varied significantly in different fertilizers depending on N:P:K ratio and fertilizer origin. Pb and Cd contents in water solution of fertilizers occurred at low ranges: 2.0-3.1 and 0.03-1.56 mg/kg, respectively. An NPK (15:15:15) fertilizer from Romania was found to contain the highest concentration of Pb and Cd as impurities. Cu content, ranging from 7.1 to 974.7 mg/kg, was the highest in coloured fertilizers from Hungary, the Netherlands and Greece. Mn value in a Hungarian NPK product (10:10:20) exceeds the average Mn value in soil. The data indicate variable contents of heavy metals in fertilizers, some of which are significantly higher than natural concentrations in soil, which suggests that they need to be continuously monitored. PDFs enclosed
The addition of unwanted elements in soil amendments, both organic and inorganic, is an internationally recognised problem
I thank you for your remarks and for the documents which you have kindly communicated to me. In view of these documents, it is important that our community is interested in this problem to quantify it at the experimental level on the fields of cultivation in order to understand the phenomenon of soil / plant transfer of certain heavy metals. We begin a study on this subject, testing several NPK fertilizers of different provenance in different soil types.
I will keep you informed of the results as and as the project evolves.
Prof. Essaid BILAL
- Badges
- Science topic