Nutrients Grow through Organic Soil Enrichment: Revitalizing Soil Health through Organic Nutrient Enrichment

Abstract

Overuse and misuse of chemical fertilizers and insecticides in agricultural intensification have resulted in a decrease in crop productiveness, low efficiency of fertilizers, and increasing environmental degradation, soil, and health degradation. All these result in massive destruction of future sustainability and viability of agriculture, balance of the ecosystem, and wealth of its inhabitants. Tropical soils are often poor in inorganic nutrients and rely on recycling nutrients from soil organic matter to maintain fertility. The professional use of organic fertilizers is minimal in industrial arable agriculture, and their influence on crop nutrition has not been thoroughly studied. Nutrients are the required chemical elements from the soil to enable proper plant growth and development. Before this, many of the fertilizers included to improve soil and grow crops were organic manure from farm yards, animal waste, compost, and vermicompost. Organic fertilizers can be enriched with mineral compounds (rock phosphate, lime, gypsum, zinc salt) and bio-fertilizers (nitrogen-fixing bacteria, phosphorus- and potassium-solubilizing bacteria, and other microbial inoculants) to improve their quality. Enrichment approaches have multiple benefits higher yields, more quality produce, resistance to abiotic and biotic stresses, increased bioavailability of essential nutrients, and enhanced soil microbial population and activity. Regular utilization of higher amounts of enriched organic fertilizers will lessen the dependence on organic manure in the long run, as well as the applied manures due to the augmented biological effectiveness of the fertilizer. It is necessary to prompt many vegetable growers to produce and utilize improved organic fertilizers/manures in organic and quality high crop production. This chapter introduces various sources, practices, and principles for enriching soil nutrients organically and highlights the importance of organic soil management in balanced and sustainable agriculture. © 2026 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.