Browsing by Author "Syvänen, Marko"

Besides farms’ main plant and animal products, meat and bone meal (MBM) represents agroecosystems’ biggest outward flow of nutriuents. MBM contains plenty of the main plant nutrients nitrogen, phosphorus and calcium (N ~8%, P ~5%, Ca usually ~10-15%, depending of the amount of bone matter), plus a little potassium (~1% or less). MBM has been proven efficient fertilizer on many plants, and it is also allowed for use in organic farming in EU. The most notable risk of MBM use relates to TSE-diseases (BSE for cattle, scrapie for sheeps and goats, and vCJD for humans). Its feed usage has been restricted in many countries since the BSE-crisis emerged in 1980’s. The rise of BSE was attributed to feeding cattle with MBM of cattle origin. Also feeding MBM to fur animals might pose a TSE-risk. However, assessing on the base of the studies included in this thesis, the TSE-risk from fertilizer use of MBM appears to be rather small. Still, a prerequisite of this is that all appropriate precautions are followed in the production and handling of MBM as well as when using it. By increasing the fertilizer use of MBM we would be able to considerably improve the nutrient cycle of phosphorus and other nutrients in our food systems. MBM is a renewable resource. The fertilizer use of MBM would also diminish the dependency on non-renewable phosphorus-rich rocks, that are commonly used in fertilizers today. MBM-fertlization was compared with mineral fertilizers in sugar beet field trials located in Southwestern Finland in the years 2008 and 2009. The cultivars used were ‘Jesper’ in 2008 and ‘Lincoln’ in 2009. The MBM source was Honkajoki Oy’s Viljo Yleislannoite 8-4-3, of which 10% was a combination of potassium sulphate fertilizer (42% K, 18% S) and plant-based side products. Viljotrials of 2009 also included added potassium sulphate to cover the nutrient requirements of sugar beet (60 kg K/ha). The plain Viljo-fertilizer produced yields that were significantly lower than control, but still above the Finnish average yields. When used in combination with mineral fertilizer (10-25% of the N content) the Viljo-trials produced yields close to the level of mineral fertilizers. The MBM-fertilization had a positive effect on beet quality in 2008 (measured in amino-N, K, and Na-concentrations), but in 2009 this effect was not present. Also, in 2008 one of the combinations (Viljo77%+NK1) produced a significantly higher sugar concentrations than the control. The sugar concentrations in 2009 didn’t differ significantly between fertilizers used but were excellent in all trials. These field trials indicate that MBM supplemented with potassium suphate has good potential for use as a fertilizer for sugar beet in Finnish conditions.