Global map of phosphorus hot spots
Posted by staff / February 7, 2011
A detailed global map reveals imbalances in the way that phosphorus, an essential plant nutrient, is being used around the world. Phosphorus-based fertilizers are an agricultural staple around the world, but phosphorus overuse can lead to freshwater pollution and the development of a host of problems, such as the spread of blue-green algae in lakes and the growth of coastal “dead zones.”
A further issue is that phosphorus comes from phosphate rock, a non-renewable resource of which there are limited supplies in such geopolitically charged areas as Western Sahara and China.
“Typically, people either worry about what happens when an excess of phosphorus finds its way into the water, or they focus on what happens when we run out of phosphorus,” says Graham MacDonald, a PhD student at McGill University, who led the study. “This is the first study that illuminates the issue on a global scale and suggests that these are not separate problems . . . that the issue is one of distributing the phosphorus we’ve got.”
Full story at Futurity.
Photo credit: McGill University
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