Which to Choose, Chemical Fertilizer or Organic Fertilizer?

Very rarely and perhaps very few farmers are aware that plants need organic matter for their survival. Not a few farmers think that if you use a lot of chemical fertilizers, you will get a lot of results. At this time there are a lot of actors (farmers) who use chemicals for fertilization and have a tendency to give more chemical fertilizers because the expected yield is high but from time to time instead of increasing, it is decreasing.

Fertilizers for plants aim to provide additional nutrients so that they can fertilize and accelerate plant growth. Currently, there are many fertilizers circulating in various forms. Starting from granular, flour, to liquid. One type of fertilizer that is often used is chemical fertilizer.

Chemical Fertilizer

Chemical fertilizers are fertilizers that are made chemically or are also often referred to as artificial fertilizers. Chemical fertilizers can be divided into single chemical fertilizers and compound chemical fertilizers. Single chemical fertilizers only contain one type of nutrient, while compound chemical fertilizers contain complete nutrients. n Chemical fertilizers that are often used include Urea and ZA for N: TSP, DSP, and ZA for P: Kcl or MOP for K. While compound fertilizers are usually made by mixing single fertilizers. The composition of nutrients varies depending on the producer and commodity.

Organic fertilizer

Organic fertilizers are made from organic or natural ingredients. Ingredients that include organic fertilizers include manure, compost, vermicompost, peat, seaweed, and guano. Based on the form, organic fertilizers can be grouped into solid organic fertilizers and liquid organic fertilizers. Some people also classify mined fertilizers such as dolomite, natural phosphate, kiserite, and also ash (which is rich in K) as organic fertilizers. Some of the organic fertilizers that are processed by the factory, for example, are blood meal, bone meal, and fish meal. Liquid organic fertilizers include compost tea, plant extracts, fermented liquid livestock waste, fermented plants, and others.

Organic fertilizers contain complete nutrients. Even in organic fertilizers, there are also other organic compounds that are beneficial for plants, such as humic acid, fulfat acid, and other organic compounds. However, the nutrient content is low. Based on my experience, there is no organic fertilizer that has a high nutrient content or equal chemical fertilizers.

Organic fertilizer

Another name for biofertilizer is biofertilizer. Some also call it a bio-fertilizer. Whatever the name of the biological fertilizer can be interpreted as a living fertilizer. Actually, the name of the fertilizer is not suitable, because biological fertilizers do not contain nutrients. Biofertilizers do not contain N, P, and K. The content of biological fertilizers is micro-organisms that have a positive role on plants. Microbes that are often used are microbes that fix N from the air, microbes that dissolve nutrients (especially P and K) microbes that stimulate plant growth.

The use of organic fertilizers also aims to restore the health of the land used, so that it will not become dead land after agricultural activities have been running for so many years. So what's the difference between organic and non-organic fertilizers?

1. Nutrient Content

Organic fertilizer has a fairly complete content of its macronutrients or its micronutrients although the nutritional content in each organic fertilizer is different in terms of content and composition.

In chemical fertilizers, there are only a few nutrients but the content is more and the levels and compositions are definite

2. Absorption of nutrients and nutrients

The nutrient content that is still in complex bonds makes it easy for plants to absorb these nutrients in the long run

In chemical fertilizers, nutrients can be absorbed easily in a short period of time but these substances can be easily lost from the soil due to erosion

3. Effect of reaction on soil and plants

The reaction of plants to natural fertilizers is quite slow so it can be used in the long term. Its durable nature can make the soil loose and increase the soil's ability to store water so that later soil fertility can be maintained

Chemical fertilizers that contain chemicals will give a very fast reaction to plants but this is not good in the long term because it can reduce soil fertility and is not good for soil structure

4. Effective use

Organic fertilizers can trigger the development of microbiota in the soil. The rapidly growing soil microbiota can make the soil rich in microbiota so that it can provide nutrients continuously because of the nature of the microbiota that describes a number of important nutrients for plants.

The use of chemical fertilizers can cause the death of microbiota it can lead to less fertile soil

5. Health benefits

The use of organic fertilizers is relatively safer and healthier because it is composed of organic materials.

Meanwhile, the use of chemical fertilizers containing inorganic synthetic compounds is suspected to be not good for the body when used on food crops in excess