The role of active soil carbon in influencing the profitability of fertilizer use: Empirical evidence from smallholder maize plots in Tanzania.

ABSTRACT: We use recent plot-level panel data from Tanzanian smallholder farmers to investigate maize yield responses to inorganic fertilizer under variable soil carbon conditions. Unlike many prior studies which consider total carbon measurements, we focus on active soil carbon, which is a component strongly related to key soil functions, such as nutrient cycling and availability. Active soil carbon is found to be a strong predictor of maize yield response to nitrogen fertilizer. These results highlight important sources of variation in the returns to fertilizer investments across plots and smallholder farmers in the region. When farmgate prices for maize and fertilizer are incorporated into calculations of economic returns, we find that the profitability of fertilizer use is strongly dependent upo

SUBMITTER: Chamberlin J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8251585 | biostudies-literature | 2021 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature