An Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) project in collaboration with farmers in Pingtung County has found that fertilizing red bean crops with liquid digestate can boost yields by 33 percent.
Digestate is the residues left from biogas production and is commonly used as an organic fertilizer.
The project was trialed on 969.91m2 of land, with biogas plant tankers providing 24 tonnes of liquid digestate, EPA Water Quality Conservation Division official Chien Liang-ta (簡良達) said on Thursday last week.
Photo: Chen Chia-yi, Taipei Times
The experiment yielded a harvest of 225kg — 33 percent more than the red bean crop grown in other fields during the same period.
The landowner, a woman surnamed Lee (李), said she needed to use only half the amount of chemical pesticides for the crop, which was also less prone to disease.
The EPA and the Council of Agriculture have been urging farmers to use liquid and solid digestate as fertilizer, given its environmental benefits.
The government this year has set aside NT$400,000 to promote digestates in Changhua, Yunlin, Chiayi and Pingtung counties, along with Tainan and Kaohsiung — and is providing NT$2,000 each to farmers as an incentive to use biogas byproducts.
EPA Division Director-General Yen Hsu-ming (顏旭明) said that all liquid and solid digestate has been processed to eliminate odor and has very low metal residues — two concerns expressed by farmers.
Soil monitoring from the project showed that using digestates did not result in an increase in heavy metals, Yen said.
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