Better manure management
- to reduce the impact of agriculture on the Baltic Sea

Beef, pork, and poultry farms in the countries around the Baltic Sea produce enormous amounts of manure each year. Because manure is bulky and expensive to transport, too much manure can be applied as fertilizer on fields nearby the animal farms. Some of the excess nutrients, which are not taken up by the plants, eventually end up in the Baltic Sea. What are the consequences for the marine environment ? Can better manure management reduce eutrophication in the sea? And what role does increasing meat consumption in Europe play?

Facilitate policy making
This project will investigate how different manure management scenarios could affect the Baltic Sea environment and provide a useful basis for decisions.  Improved manure management could reduce nutrient pressure on the Baltic Sea.

The goals are to

• Quantify manure production in relation to chemical fertilizer use and crop nutrient needs for the Baltic Sea catchment.
• Identify nutrient hotspots, regions with excess nitrogen or phosphorous where there is potential for leakage to rivers and the sea.
• In collaboration with Go4Baltic (BONUS project), evaluate the efficiency and effectiveness of international, national, and regional policies and conduct a survey of farmers to understand current manure management practices and how different types of polcies affect farmer behavior.
• Investigate the potential to reduce nutrient inputs to the Sea and the effect on eutrophication.