Organic farming boosts wheat crop nitrogen efficiency, outperforms chemical fertilizers.
The study looked at how different types of organic fertilizers affect nitrogen availability in wheat crops. They compared using inorganic fertilizers alone to using a mix of inorganic fertilizers and organic inputs like green manure and farmyard manure. They found that incorporating legume biomass and farmyard manure provided consistent nitrogen supply, sometimes even better than using only inorganic fertilizers. Overall, using organic inputs increased nitrogen use efficiency by 1.3-2 times, with crop residue-based management being the most efficient.