Response of Guatemala Corn to Fertilization1

Abstract

Expansion of corn production of Thailand, in the past, has been largely through the opening of new land for cultivation. Now that new land is becoming limited, and the demand for corn in the Asian market is increasing steadily, the additional increase of national corn production will depend on the improvement of soil fertility or fertilization, corn varieties and other farm practices. Corn fertilization in Thailand is not a common practice among the corn growers. Eventhough many of them have heard that the use of fertilizers could bring up the yield, farmers still hesitate to use fertilizers on their corn. This may be explained by the fact that there is no clear evidences from experimental results to assure them as to how much responses of corn to fertilization could be obtained agronomically as well as economically, at different fertility levels of soils.