Trade and the role of non-food commodities for global eutrophication

Hamilton, Helen A.; Ivanova, Diana; Stadler, Konstantin; Merciai, Stefano; Schmidt, Jannick Højrup; Zelm, Rosalie van; Moran, Daniel; Wood, Richard

doi:10.1038/s41893-018-0079-z

Cited by 78 publications

(54 citation statements)

References 51 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…However, in our research the forestry sector was merged into the agriculture sector, leading to an overestimation of the phosphorus fertilizers embodied in wood sectors. Though there might be some bias in certain sectors, the overall pattern was robust compared with the work of Hamilton et al (), who found that 21% (26% in our research) of the phosphorus use was embodied in trade in 2011, and 49% (48% in our research) of the phosphorus embodied in trade were due to the consumption of nonfood commodities.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 78%

Improving the Imbalanced Global Supply Chain of Phosphorus Fertilizers

et al. 2019

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The unbalanced use of phosphorus fertilizers at the global scale has resulted in phosphorus fertilizer scarcity in less developed areas as well as eutrophication problems in developed and large emerging countries. Historically, the uneven distribution of phosphate rock has been regarded as the major reason for this unbalanced use. However, the international trade of commodities may also play an important role in the unbalanced use of phosphorus fertilizers. By tracing the trade flows of commodities, we found that nearly 5.2 Tg of phosphorus fertilizer was embodied in traded commodities, which were mainly exported from large emerging countries (with low phosphorus use efficiencies) to developed countries (e.g., the US, Western Europe and Japan, commonly with high phosphorus use efficiencies). Furthermore, among the 5.2 Tg of phosphorus fertilizer embodied in traded commodities, 2.5 Tg was embodied in the trade of commodities from industry, construction, and services. Our results indicate that this trade pattern could create substantial mutual benefits if improvements are made to the phosphorus supply chain. With technology transfer and financial support from developed countries, large emerging countries could use phosphorus fertilizers more efficiently, thereby reducing the risk of eutrophication and lowering the cost of agricultural production. The phosphorus fertilizers saved by large emerging countries could be partially used to enhance food production in Sub‐Saharan African countries. This optimized supply chain could reduce eutrophication, conserve phosphate rock resources, and enhance global agricultural production.

show abstract

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 78%

Improving the Imbalanced Global Supply Chain of Phosphorus Fertilizers

et al. 2019

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The water samplings we collected mixed evenly and vertically. As indicated in Figure 1, water samples were collected from thirty three sampling points located in the lake (i.e., points [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18], in the groundwater wells around the lake (points G1-G10), as well as the junctures between the major lake and the Xinmiao Wetland (S4) and agricultural drainage ditches (S1-S3, S4). These sampling points were selected to study the spatial variations of water quality.…”

Section: Water Sample Collectionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Eutrophication has caused a series of water quality problems for freshwater and marine ecosystems, which are caused by the response of natural waters to an excessive input of nutrients [1][2][3]. The effect of eutrophication on global warming and growing human populations act in concert with increasing nutrients, especially in recent decades [4][5][6][7][8]. Systematic water quality monitoring, risk assessment, and preventative measures are important tools adopted by environmental protection agencies to tackle the problem of lake eutrophication.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessment of Lake Water Quality and Eutrophication Risk in an Agricultural Irrigation Area: A Case Study of the Chagan Lake in Northeast China

Liu

Zhang

Sun

et al. 2019

Water

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Water quality safety is the key factor to maintain the ecosystem service functions of lakes. Field investigations and statistical analyses were carried out to study the water quality of a large, agriculture-stressed lakes (e.g., Chagan Lake) in Northeast China. The hydro-chemical properties of the Chagan Lake are HCO3·CO3-Na. Nutrient (N and P) and non-nutrient (pH and F−) were found to be the major factors that threaten water quality safety of the lake. The concentration of total nitrogen (TN) and total phosphorus (TP) was found to vary seasonally and at different locations. The overall lake water had mean TN and TP values of 2.19 mg/L and 0.49 mg/L, respectively, in summer. TN was the major factor for water quality deterioration in the western region of the lake, while TP was the principal factor in the other regions, as determined by a principal component analysis (PCA). Fluoride (F−) concentration in the lake water were related to the values of total dissolved solid (TDS), pH, and electrical conductivity (EC). In addition, eutrophication is a fundamental index that has been affecting the ecological evaluation of water quality. The results showed that trophic level index (TLI), trophic state index (TSI), and eutrophication index (EI) were evaluated to quantify the risk of eutrophication. However, TLI and TSI can better describe the purification effect of the wetland. These indices showed that the lake water was hyper-eutrophic in summer, with TLI, TSI, and EI values of 60.1, 63.0, and 66.6, respectively. Disparities in water quality were observed among whole areas of the lake. Overall, this study revealed that controlling agriculture drainage is crucial for lake water quality management. The study generated critical data for making water quality management plans to control the risk.

show abstract

“…The application of biodiversity characterization factors (Verones et al 2017) and net-primary productivity (Kastner et al 2015;Weinzettel et al 2019) are simple extensions to obtain more policy-relevant work. Furthermore, the correlation (Silva Simas et al 2017) of land use with other agricultural impacts such as blue water consumption (Lutter et al 2016) and eutrophication (Hamilton et al 2018) gives a good basis for further extension.…”

Section: Further Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Adding country resolution to EXIOBASE: impacts on land use embodied in trade

Bjelle

Többen

Stadler

et al. 2020

Economic Structures

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

From the early developments of domestic input-output analysis starting with Leontief (1936), the scope has broadened, both to account for trade relationships across economies (Leontief and Strout 1963) and to extend the framework to enable the attribution of social and environmental impacts, domestic and abroad, to economic activities (Leontief 1970; Miller and Blair 2009). Multiregional input-output (MRIO) models

show abstract

Trade and the role of non-food commodities for global eutrophication

Cited by 78 publications

References 51 publications

Improving the Imbalanced Global Supply Chain of Phosphorus Fertilizers

Improving the Imbalanced Global Supply Chain of Phosphorus Fertilizers

Assessment of Lake Water Quality and Eutrophication Risk in an Agricultural Irrigation Area: A Case Study of the Chagan Lake in Northeast China

Adding country resolution to EXIOBASE: impacts on land use embodied in trade

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About