Why seaweed fertilizer is called the blue seafood of crops

Seaweed is one of the oldest species on Earth, and humanity's use of seaweed is both ancient and modern. From a home-style dish on the dining table, to paper-thin seaweed cellulose batteries, to high-end marine biological products such as medical dressings, face masks and surgical sutures, technological innovation has changed the traditional value of seaweed, driven the blue economy, and imperceptibly influenced people's lives.

This time, a "new dish" has been added to the seaweed menu——sea lettuce weed. "Sea lettuce weed is a species of the Sargassaceae family. Because its texture is crisp and tender and extremely refreshing, as delicious as lettuce, it was named sea lettuce weed." said Tang Jie, general manager of Beijing Leili Marine Bioindustry New Industry Co., Ltd. Unlike traditional seaweed foods such as kelp, sea lettuce weed is a new wild product that the Leili team spent years searching for and collected in the Yellow Sea waters at 35°E and 120°N.

"These waters are a zero-pollution, low-water-temperature sea area, with rapid currents and a large exchange of nutrients. The pure and sound ecological environment makes sea lettuce weed grow robustly, accumulate nutrients fully, and keep the algal body clean." Tang Jie, who has been engaged in seaweed research for more than 20 years, was extremely excited about this discovery. "Seaweed is rich in iodine, amino acids, minerals and various trace elements, and has long been known as 'ocean vegetable'. It is of great benefit to human health."

People have a long history of eating seaweed. Historically, British sailors have records of using red algae to prevent and treat scurvy, the Irish once relied on red algae and green algae to survive famine years, and Japan began eating nori in the 8th century, and to this day its annual consumption of seaweed reaches 100,000 tons.

In China, however, seaweed was used more as medicine in the early period, while terrestrial foods have always occupied a dominant position in the Chinese diet. In recent years, with the rise of the organic and green concept, the idea of a low-fat, low-calorie healthy diet has been highly praised, and seaweed grown in the open ocean and free from land-based chemical pollution has also begun to enter ordinary households.

The popularity of seaweed foods has also driven the development of the seaweed industry. At present, the seaweed farming industry is distributed across 44 countries worldwide, with annual output reaching tens of millions of tons and a value of billions of US dollars. China's total annual seaweed farming output reaches more than 7 million tons, accounting for almost half of the world's total output. "Seaweed's healthy image provides opportunities for seaweed producers. In addition to common food ingredients such as nori and sea cabbage, seaweed-flavored snacks such as dried seaweed shreds, seaweed noodles, seaweed seasoning sauce and ready-to-eat seaweed dishes are also gradually gaining favor in the market." Tang Jie said. More and more businesses have smelled the business opportunity in the seaweed market, and a high-value-added industry has risen. The seaweed industry chain has developed from single seaweed farming to deep processing of food and health products using seaweed, and then to using seaweed extracts to make seaweed fertilizer to nourish crops.

Now, seaweed fertilizer lets crops "eat" new nutrition. Seaweed fertilizer is a fertilizer made with marine plant seaweed as the main raw material or core raw material, through a special extraction process, and then processed with nutrient elements essential to crops. "Applying seaweed fertilizer is like letting crops 'eat seafood'. Seaweed is usually divided by color into red algae, green algae and brown algae. The extract of Sargassum in brown algae has high nutritional value and can improve the quality of agricultural products. The fruits, vegetables and grains grown are all very plump and highly nutritious." Tang Jie introduced that many minerals in the Earth's soil were deposited by marine organisms. With the rapid development of agricultural planting, the soil has become barren. Through seaweed biotechnology, the soil can be restored to its original state, the nutritional value of crops can be improved, and the taste becomes better.

As early as the 17th century, in some coastal European countries and regions, seaweed fertilizer was widely used. In the Brittany and Normandy areas of France, crops and vegetables grown along hundreds of miles of coastline became famous because of the use of seaweed compost, and the area had the reputation of the "Golden Coast". By the 1940s and 1950s, countries such as the United Kingdom and the United States successively established seaweed fertilizer production plants. In 1993, the American Phoenix-250 seaweed fertilizer was officially designated by the United States Department of Agriculture as a special fertilizer for agriculture in the United States, and seaweed fertilizer received unprecedented attention.

But in China, until Tang Jie began researching and developing seaweed fertilizer in 1994, not only was there no folk tradition of applying seaweed fertilizer, there was also no relevant scientific research accumulation in academia. "It was not until 1998, when the scientific and technological achievement of Leili's seaweed liquid fertilizer Leili 2000 functional compound liquid fertilizer obtained certification from the Ministry of Agriculture, that China achieved a zero breakthrough in independently researching and developing seaweed fertilizer." Tang Jie said. Although seaweed fertilizer finally appeared in China, it took a relatively long time for the market to accept this new thing. At first, the promotion of seaweed fertilizer was extremely difficult. As the earliest enterprise in China to research and develop seaweed fertilizer, Leili Agricultural Chemical Co., Ltd. had to first turn its eyes overseas, and only returned to the domestic market after the market and technology were relatively mature. "At present, our products have been promoted to 80 countries and regions, and we have taken the lead in establishing a green fertilizer chain operation system in China, with more than 4,000 stores opened." Tang Jie said.

According to data obtained from experiments in many places, applying seaweed fertilizer to crops such as citrus, cherry, grape and apple can generally increase yield by 10% to 15%, save costs and increase income by 100 to 200 yuan per mu, and the output-to-input ratio can reach 4.3:1. High returns have prompted the rapid development of the seaweed fertilizer industry. To date, there are as many as dozens of seaweed fertilizer varieties on the market, including liquid, powder and granular forms. There are more than 300 seaweed fertilizer production enterprises, and the total annual output value grows at a rate of 30%, with huge room for growth. In addition to improving the quality of agricultural products, what is even more valuable is that the use of seaweed fertilizer can also reduce environmental pollution. The traditional chemical fertilizer industry consumes non-renewable resources such as natural gas and petroleum, while seaweed absorbs nutrients from the ocean in the sea, and at the same time it is a renewable resource that can be recycled.