Estimates of crop nitrogen (N) uptake and offtake are critical in estimating N balances, N use efficiencies and potential losses to the environment. Calculation of crop N uptake and offtake requires estimates of crop product yield (e.g. grain or beans) and crop residue yield (e.g. straw or stover) and the N concentration of both components. Yields of crop products are often reasonably well known, but those of crop residues are not. While the harvest index (HI) can be used to interpolate the quantity of crop residue from available data on crop product yields, harvest indices are known to vary across locations, as do N concentrations of residues and crop products. The increasing availability of crop data and advanced statistical and machine learning methods present us with an opportunity to move towards more locally relevant estimates of crop harvest index and N concentrations using more readily available data. This dataset includes maize field experiment data. It is a culmination of summary statistic data collected from the literature as well as raw data requested from various researchers and organisations from around the world. These data will enable more locally relevant estimates of crop nutrient offtake, nutrient balances and nutrient use efficiency at national, regional or global levels, as part of strategies towards more sustainable nutrient management.

Maize field experiment data were collected from a search across the world using two main sources. One source was from summary statistics gleaned from the peer reviewed literature and the other source was for raw datasets obtained through requests of various researchers and organisations. Further details of how these two sources of data were collected and processed are described by Ludemann et al. (2022).

Reference

Ludemann CI, Hijbeek R, van Loon MP, Murrell ST, Dobermann A, van Ittersum MK, 2022 Estimating maize harvest index and nitrogen concentrations in grain and residue using globally available data Field Crops Research 284:108578 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fcr.2022.108578