China Goes for Seaweed Fertilizer   

Seaweed fertilizer, made from natural seaweed via high-tech process, is a new type of organic fertilizer. Sometimes a certain amount of nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium and other trace elements can also be added in seaweed fertilizer, which is called the fourth generation fertilizer after organic fertilizer, chemical fertilizer and bio-fertilizer. Seaweed fertilizer contains the essence extracted from natural seaweed and to a great extent retains such natural bioactive ingredients like auxin, gibberellin, cytokinins, polyphenols as well as antibiotics. Seaweed fertilizer can help crops grow better by enhancing their vitality and resistance to worms, drought and low temperature. Seaweed fertilizer is also harmless to humans and animals, as well as the environment, making it a natural, efficient and new type of green organic fertilizer.
   The core of seaweed fertilizer is natural seaweed extract. Through special biochemical processes, natural active ingredients are retained in the extract, which contains a large amount of non-nitrogen organic compounds, and 40-plus mineral elements such as potassium, calcium, magnesium, zinc and iodine as well as rich vitamins. Particularly, the extract contains algal polysaccharides, sodium alginate, highly unsaturated fatty acids and a number of natural plant growth regulators, which are of very high biological activity.
   The activity of seaweed fertilizer largely depends on how the natural active ingredients are extracted. Currently the best method is enzymatic hydrolysis extraction, followed by physical method, while the last choice is chemical extraction based on strong acid or alkali. At present most manufacturers are using chemical extraction, a method that will damage the activity of the endogenous substances of seaweed. Using physical purification processes such as cell disruption, the activity can be preserved to the maximum degree.
   China, rich in seaweed, only started the research and development of seaweed fertilizer in the late 1990s. The raw materials and production costs in China are higher than those in developed nations.
   In recent years, the development of seaweed fertilizer gets a boost as China pays more attention on green agriculture. The quality of seaweed fertilizer is already very stable and there are tens of different types of products available including base fertilizer, water flush fertilizer and foliar fertilizer, meeting various farming demand. The market outlook for seaweed fertilizer is quite good.
   The fertilizer registration department under the Ministry of Agriculture in 2000 formally set up the "soluble fertilizer containing alginate" category. After nearly 10 years of development, China's seaweed fertilizer industry has begun to take a shape.
   China Ocean University Organism Project Development Co., Ltd., which was established in 2000, is the largest seaweed fertilizer producer in China. The company sells products to more than 20 countries and regions including Italy, Germany, the Netherlands, Malaysia, India and Japan. Based on plant micro-ecology and nutrition theories, the company has developed a new generation of seaweed fertilizer that combines the ingredients of seaweed with a variety of microbial strains featuring special functions. By doing so, the advantages of seaweed fertilizer and microbial fertilizer are perfectly combined.
   China Ocean University Organism built a 140 000 m2 production base at the Jiaozhou Bay industrial park in 2006, where it introduced a world-class 100 000 t/a automated production line. At present, China Ocean University Organism holds six patented technology and has more than 100 products out of five major groups including compound seaweed fertilizer, water flush fertilizer, bacterial fertilizer, foliar fertilizer and special function fertilizer. The firm had set up a special task force to study the degradation, processing and extraction of enteromorpha prolifera when a major algae outbreak hit Qingdao at the end of June 2008; it has focused its research on enteromorpha prolifera, using it as the main feedstock to produce seaweed granular and water flush fertilizer in commercial scale. The reuse of enteromorpha prolifera also solved the problem of pollution.
   Beijing's Leili Agrochemistry Co., Ltd., which started studying seaweed fertilizer in 1994, has successfully developed its own products. The company selected several seaweed species featuring high fertilizer effect out of dozens. With special extraction methods, the company can make highly concentrated liquid fertilizer - with dozens of nutrients in each one milliliter of the liquid. That contains 20% - 45% of soluble active ingredient content.
   In 2009, Leili completed construction on a 350 000 t/a seaweed fertilizer industrial base in Shandong province, developing a group of products such as Haidefeng algae essence, green algae essence, Leili nutrition lawn functional fertilizer, seaweed fertilizer and seaweed root promoter, filling the vacuum in seaweed fertilizer research in China. Its products have been tried out on a number of crops in more than 10 domestic provinces and also in foreign countries such as Australia and Indonesia. Results showed they can boost yield by 8.6%-36.5% for different crops, boasting an input/output ratio of 1:8.6-225.
   The Beijing-based seaweed biological R&D center, funded by Beijing Leili, began operating in October 2010. The center focuses on the research of how the active factors of algae will help regulate the health and nutrition of crops and is also involved in the nation's basic study program on seaweed technology and in international technology exchange and cooperation. The company is now planning its Leili seaweed fertilizer demonstration industrial park, with an aim to build China's first 200 000 t/a seaweed compound fertilizer and bio-fertilizer co-generation facility in Shandong province in the first part of 2011, which is capable of serving 133 000 hectares of crops and improving soil. The company plans to build another four to five seaweed fertilizer production bases in the coming three to five years.
   After years of repeated experiments and field trials, Zhejiang Dongyang Lianfeng Biological Technology Co., Ltd. has developed its "Lilijia" natural marine seaweed fertilizer by using the world's latest bio-technology combined with research achievements in plant nutrition and plant immunology, among others. This product uses seaweed (brown algae) as key feedstock and lichens (algae strains) and pollen as supplementary materials. It is refined and extracted following a two-stage fermentation process with specially selected micro-organisms. This product contains a large number of highly reactive substances required during plant growth and metabolism such as alginic acid, humic acid, nucleic acids, carbohydrates and vitamins, as well as more than 40 minerals including copper, molybdenum, zinc, boron, potassium, calcium, magnesium, iron and iodine. Particularly, it contains seaweed polysaccharides, mannitol and highly unsaturated fatty acids, which can especially be found in seaweed, as well as a variety of natural plant growth regulators such as gibberellin, cell kinetin, auxin, abscisic acid and betaine, making it a multifunctional nutritious marine product.
   Shandong province-based Yantai Swide Biological Technology Co., Ltd. offers Swide-branded seaweed fertilizer in various forms of liquid, paste, and powder, as well as particles, which feature stable quality and effect. The company supplies all its products to domestic high-end green organic vegetable bases, pollution-free planting bases and golf courses as well as for exports.