Plant beans to fertilize the soil

Photo credit: SciDevNet

Image credit: Robin Hammond / Panos

• Beans could help fill Africa’s fertiliser gap

  Speed read

  • Sub-Saharan Africa sees low amounts of nitrogen fertiliser use, which results in low yields
  • The N2Africa project backs the cheaper option of growing nitrogen-fixing beans
  • This has helped to raise average maize yields by at least 40 per cent

  Growing beans – http://pixabay.com/static/uploads/photo/2014/01/29/05/31/planting-of-beans-254075_640.jpg

  An ongoing project that encourages African farmers to plant beans as food and fertiliser could help counteract the impact of limited fertiliser take-up across the continent as highlighted in a recent report.

  Global use of nitrogen fertiliser is forecast to grow by 1.4 per cent each year to above 119 million tonnes in 2018, according to a report published last week (16 February) by the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

  But less than five per cent of that growth will come from Sub-Saharan Africa, largely because fertiliser…