NITROGEN MANAGEMENT – AN IMPORTANT DETERMINANT OF SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE

Abstract

The aim of the paper is to identify changes in nitrogen management in individual agriculture and result assessment in the context of sustainable development. The paper showed the essential elements of nitrogen balancing on agricultural area. Research was conducted at a national as well as voivodship level, making it possible to determine the scale of diversity of regional nitrogen management in individual agriculture and verify the regional divergence process in this scope. Analysis was based on data collected during the Farm Structure Survey in 2007 and 2016 prepared by the Statistical Office in Olsztyn, for individual farms with at least 1 ha of UAA in GAEC. The period of research captured the trend of changes in nitrogen management on farms over a 10 year-period. Nitrogen gross balance was calculated on the basis of OECD and EUROSTAT methodology. The results indicated the need to improve nitrogen management to optimize it in relation to crop nutritional needs and local soil conditions. Not only environmental considerations but, above all, economic ones, are an important prerequisite for increasing farmer interest in such activities. Regional diversification of nitrogen economy is progressing, indicating an ongoing divergence (polarization) process. This process is the result of a number of different factors, including organizational and environmental ones.

Keywords

• nitrogen
• nitrogen fertilizers
• nitrogen gross balance
• sustainable agriculture
• sustainable farm