Heavy Metal Evaluation of Overused Commercial Fertilizers and Their Interactions with Soil Properties

Abstract

Şanlıurfa province has 36% of the agricultural areas in Turkey and 64.1% of the agricultural areas in the GAP Region. With approximately 600 000 tons of chemical fertilizer consumption in 2021, it is the province with the most fertilizer consumption in Turkey. This causes some negative and high environmental risks such as salinization in the soil, heavy metal (HM) accumulation, deterioration of nutrient balance, damage to microorganism activity, and formation of eutrophication in the region. The objective of this study was to determine the HMs (Zn, Ni, Mn, Cu, Mo, Pb, Cd) concentrations of the soils and some commercial fertilizers overused, and evaluate their interactions with soil properties. The average values of HM concentration of the soil are as follows; 32.65 and 46.88 mg kg-1 Zn; 649.03 and 730.58 mg kg-1 Mn; 79.86 and 95.54 mg kg-1 Ni; 0.15 to 0.27 mg kg-1 Cd; 0.26 and 0.97 mg kg-1 Mo; 8.54 and 18.67 mg kg-1 Pb; 19.45-25.37 mg kg-1 Cu. HM contents of some fertilizers were found to be very high in this study. This causes an increase in the HM concentration in the soil. HMs concentrations of several soil samples exceeded the threshold level of Europe standards except for Ni, Mo, and Mn. Study results can help the authorities to develop effective fertilizer management strategies for the Harran Plain, which has once again revealed the necessity of applying agricultural activities such as fertilization with a fertilization program prepared under expert control according to the results of soil analysis.