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Spraying with various types of agrochemical substances, including biostimulants, is one of the basic agricultural treatments affecting the yield size and quality. The selected type of spraying nozzles can influence biological effectiveness of the applied substances. A 2-year field study showed which of the investigated nozzles increase the effectiveness of foliar application of a free amino acid biostimulant. The type of nozzle used for the application of biostimulants was reported to significantly influence the biometric properties and yield of soybean cultivation. It was observed that spraying nozzles, which generate finer droplets positively influence positively the biometric properties of plants and seed yield of seed than injector nozzles, which produce coarser droplets. A significant reduction of the thousand seeds mass after applying the biostimulant with standard flat fan nozzles is an exception. A 25.61% increase in soybean yield was reported after applying the biostimulant with standard flat fan nozzles and a 11.35% increase – with injector nozzles..

The study assesses the impact of the economic size of farms on the efficiency of their material and energy expenditure, based on 679 farms from the Lubelskie Voivodeship. The analysis was made for the years 2013-2015 and the farms were divided into six economic size classes. 5 indexes for the efficiency of material, energy and material-energy expenditures were calculated for all farms. The aim of the work was to select a group of farms with the highest efficiency of energy and material expenditure. It was found that economically small farms managed this expenditure most effectively, as evidenced by the highest values of 4 out of 5 analyzed indexes. Very small and medium-small farms demonstrated the highest efficiency of material expenditure. In contrast, energy expenditure was most efficiently used by medium-small farms. The farms that were the largest economically were characterized by the highest efficiency index of material and energy expenditure, calculated as the ratio of total production to the expenditure.

To meet the Paris Agreement goal of limiting average global warming to less than 1.5°C above pre-industrial temperatures, European Union (EU) aims to reduce by 40% its domestic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2030 and in the longer term to become the world’s first climate-neutral economy by 2050 (“Green Deal”). Today, 10% of the European GHG emissions derive directly from agriculture, and measures to decrease or compensate these emissions are required for achieving climatic goals. The role of soils in the global carbon cycle and the importance of reducing GHG emissions from agriculture has been increasingly acknowledged (IPCC, 2018, EEA report 2019). The “4 per 1000” initiative (4p1000) has become a prominent model for mitigating climate change and securing food security through an annual increase in soil organic carbon (SOC) stocks by 0.4 %, or 4‰ per year, in the first 0-40 cm of soil. However, the feasibility of the 4p1000 scenario and more generally the capacity of European countries to implement soil carbon sequestration (SCS) measures are highly uncertain.As part of the EJP Soil project, we collected country-specific informationonon on the available knowledge and data of achievable carbon sequestration in mineral agricultural soils (cropland and grassland) across Europe, under various farming systems and pedo-climatic conditions. With this bottom-up approach, we provide a reality check on weather European countries are on track in relation to GHG reductions targets and the “4p1000” initiative. First results showed that the availability of datasets on SCS is heterogeneous across Europe. While northern Europe and central Europe is relatively well studied, references are lacking for parts of Southern, Southeaster and Western Europe. Further, this stocktake highlighted that the current country-based knowledge and engagement is still poor; very few countries have an idea on their national-wide achievable SCS potential. Nevertheless, national SCS potentials that were estimated for 13 countries support the view that SCS can contribute significantly to climate mitigation, covering from 1 to 28, 5 % of the domestic GHG emissions from the agricultural sector, which underpins the importance of further investigations.

Phosphorus (P) fertilizer recommendations of individual countries may differ in many aspects, but often the main principle is to reach or maintain a target range of plant-available P in soil. Within this target P fertility class, the soil is expected to supply enough P to the crop, while P fertilization replaces what is exported by the harvested crop. However, the threshold values of the target P fertility classes are based on a multitude of different soil test P (STP) methods and vary by a factor of up to three, even for countries using the same STP method. This study aimed to provide a comparison of the thresholds of target P fertility classes of different European countries and critical soil test P values (Pcrit; STP below which the average relative yield falls below 95% due to P insufficiency) derived from the analysis of data from 55 long-term field experiments in eight European countries. To overcome the issue of diverging STP methods, all values were converted to Olsen-P using empirically based conversion equations from the literature. Converted threshold values varied by a factor of up to five. For the experimental data, we fitted multi-level Mitscherlich-type models to determine Pcrit values of unfertilized soils corresponding to 95% of maximum yield. We found an average Olsen-Pcrit value of 15 mg P kg−1 (adj. R² = 0.37; RMSE = 14.1% relative yield; n = 2368; 55 experiments), which lies far below several country-specific thresholds of target P fertility classes. Crop-specific analyses resulted in higher Olsen-Pcrit values for sugar beet (22 mg P kg−1), potato (19 mg P kg−1) and winter rapeseed (18 mg P kg−1). Among the texture classes (loam, sand, silt and clay), sandy soils exhibited the highest average Olsen-Pcrit value (22 mg P kg−1). We consider a reevaluation of extraordinarily high country-specific thresholds as well as an inclusion of crop type and soil texture (where not already implemented) to be a reasonable measure towards more cost-effective and environment-friendly P fertilization.