Global phosphorus shortage will be aggravated by soil erosion

Soil phosphorus (P) loss from agricultural systems will limit food and feed production in the future. Here, we combine spatially distributed global soil erosion estimates (considering sheet and rill erosion by water) with spatially distributed global P content for cropland soils to assess global soil P loss. The world’s soils are currently being depleted in P in spite of high chemical fertilizer input. Africa (unable to afford high costs of chemical fertilizer), South America (due to inefficient organic P management), and Eastern Europe (for a combination of these reasons) have the highest P depletion rates. In a future world with an assumed absolute shortage of mineral P fertilizer, agricultural soils worldwide will be depleted by 4–19 kg ha−1 yr−1, with average losses of P due to erosion by water contributing over 50% of total P losses.

Christine Alewell, Bruno Ringeval, Cristiano Ballabio, David A. Robinson, Panos Panagos, Pasquale Borrelli