Nutrients, Food and Environment
Our vision is Sustainable agriculture for soil, water and air. Our ambitions are to:
- Perform research on understanding and modeling carbon, nutrient, and pollutant dynamics within agricultural ecosystems across varying scales.
- Educate BSc, MSc, and PhD students in linking food, water, soil and the environment.
- Collaborate with global research communities on agricultural ecosystem management.
- Inform relevant stakeholders in the agricultural sector (policy, farmer associations, supply chain) on sustainable farming practices and governance approaches.
Our research focuses on better understanding of the complex interactions between food production, soil quality, water availability, carbon and nutrient dynamics, and environmental impacts in response to agricultural management. To achieve this, we combine process-based/empirical modeling with data-driven insights from methods such as meta-analysis and machine learning. Our central research lines are (see figure):
- Food production in response to Nutrient and Water availability
- Interactions between Food Production and Soil health
- Interactions between Food Production and Environment
Our area of interests include: the Netherlands, Europe and China with high intensity agriculture (with priority on reducing environmental impacts while sustaining the food production), Africa (with low intensity agriculture with priority on food production) and global.
Food production in response to Nutrient and Water availability
Nutrient and water availability are interconnected to sustain sufficient and healthy food production. Water stress can limit the movement of nutrients to and within the plant, leading to nutrient deficiencies and reduced crop productivity. Conversely, nutrient deficiencies can reduce crop water-use efficiency, affecting overall plant health and productivity. In addition, nutrient interactions occur when one nutrient influences the uptake and utilization of another nutrient, either in a beneficial synergistic way or in an adverse antagonistic way. In this research line we assess those interactions on food production.
Interactions between Food Production and Soil Health
Soil health is highly relevant for sustainable food production as it plays a crucial role in the overall productivity and resilience of agricultural systems. Healthy soils are not just a growing medium for crops, but they regulate and support essential ecosystem services, such as water purification, carbon sequestration, and nutrient cycling, and they provide habitats for biodiversity. In this research line we focus on the fate of major nutrients (N, P, K, Ca, Mg and S) and metals/minor nutrients (Cu, Zn, Cd, Fe, Mo, B) in soils and their impacts on soil health in interaction with soil properties including pH, CEC, and contents of soil organic matter, clay and Al and Fe oxides.
Interactions between Food Production and Environment
Agriculture faces several challenges that require innovative solutions to ensure sustainable food production and address global food security. Sustainable means here that undesired carbon, nutrient and pollutant fluxes, negatively affecting air and water quality and biodiversity, are avoided or minimized without negative impacts on food production and food quality. In this research line we focus on the identification of optimum land use practices in view of an optimal balance between food production, accumulation in soil and losses to air and water, using empirical and process based model approaches.
Integrated interactions between food systems, water,
soil and environment
soil and environment
Food systems are a dominant driver of global environmental change causing alone, or in combination the transgression of planetary boundaries for biogeochemical flows, biosphere integrity, climate change (greenhouse gas emissions) and the use of land and water. Dietary changes, reduction in food loss and waste, enhanced circularity and improved management practices can help to bring us back within those planetary boundaries while producing sufficient food to feed around 10 billion people in 2050. In this research line we focus on the identification of optimum food systems, in terms of aspects such as ‘which crops to grow where’, ‘which fertilizers to use’, ‘which animals to keep’, and ‘which food to consume’, based on human and planetary heath constraints.
