Calculating N fertilizer doses for oil-seed rape using plant and soil data

We evaluated the economic and environmental interests of a balance-sheet method recently developed for calculating N fertilizer doses for oil-seed rape. The evaluation was performed using simple models of yield, grain oil content, and residual soil mineral nitrogen responses to applied N. The models were fitted to 53 fertilizer trials carried out in France between 1993 and 1999. The results show that the use of the balance-sheet method decreases the variability of farmers' income, increases grain quality, and decreases the risk of water pollution by nitrate.