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Food Waste–Derived Organic Fertilizers: Critical Insights, Agronomic Impacts, and Pathways for Sustainable Adoption
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This review critically examined four conversion routes for turning food waste into organic fertilizers—composting, vermicomposting, anaerobic digestion, and pyrolysis—evaluating their impacts on soil health, nutrient cycling, crop yield, and environmental trade-offs including microplastic contamination.
Food waste is one of the fastest growing sustainability challenges, wasting scarce resources and aggravating environmental degradation. Its valorization into organic fertilizers provides a critical opportunity to recover nutrients, reduce landfill burdens, and strengthen circular bioeconomy strategies. This review critically examines FW-derived organic fertilizers (FWOFs) across four major conversion routes including composting, vermicomposting, anaerobic digestion, and pyrolysis and also evaluates their impacts on soil health, nutrient cycling, crop yield and quality, and environmental trade-offs. We emphasize that while FWOFs offer multiple benefits, outcomes remain highly variable due to heterogeneity in feedstocks, processing methods, and application practices. Evidence highlights the strong potential for improving soil organic matter, water retention, and micronutrient supply but also raises unresolved risks from heavy metals, microplastics, and the survival of pathogens. By integrating multiscale evidence, this review provides a fertilizer-focused perspective that identifies critical knowledge gaps, standardization needs, and adoption pathways. In conclusion, this work underscores both the opportunities and limitations of FWOFs, offering concise guidance for advancing sustainable agriculture and circular bioeconomy practices.
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Microplastics in composts, digestates, and food wastes: A review
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This review examines how food waste composting and recycling processes can introduce microplastics into agricultural soil. When food waste mixed with plastic packaging is composted or processed through anaerobic digestion, microplastic fragments can end up in the soil amendments spread on farmland. The findings highlight an overlooked pathway by which microplastics enter the food chain, as crops grown in contaminated compost may absorb or accumulate plastic particles.
From organic fertilizer to the soils: What happens to the microplastics? A critical review
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This review traces how microplastics enter agricultural soil through organic fertilizers made from municipal waste, sewage sludge, and animal manure. During the composting process, the microplastics undergo physical and chemical changes that can make them better at absorbing other pollutants from the soil. The review highlights that applying organic fertilizer to farmland is a major but often overlooked pathway for microplastics to contaminate the food supply.
Organic fertilizers as a vector of microplastics: A comprehensive review of sources, dispersion, and environmental consequences
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This review synthesized evidence on how organic fertilizers — including sewage sludge and composts — act as vectors for microplastic transport into agricultural soils. The authors document how MPs from degraded plastics, textiles, and personal care products enter farming systems and affect soil health, plant growth, and the broader food chain.
Do contaminants compromise the use of recycled nutrients in organic agriculture? A review and synthesis of current knowledge on contaminant concentrations, fate in the environment and risk assessment
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This review examines whether recycled nutrients from waste streams, such as sewage sludge and compost, introduce harmful contaminants including microplastics into organic farmland. While levels of heavy metals and many pollutants have decreased in European waste streams, microplastic contamination in agricultural soil remains widespread and poorly understood. The review highlights that spreading waste-derived fertilizers on farmland is a significant pathway for microplastics to enter the food production system.
The treatment of the organic fraction of municipal solid waste (OFMSW) as a possible source of micro- and nano-plastics and bioplastics in agroecosystems: a review
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Researchers reviewed how treating municipal organic waste — like food scraps — for compost and fertilizer introduces micro- and nanoplastics, including fragments of biodegradable plastics, into farmland soils, with current data too limited to fully assess the contamination risk of applying this waste to agricultural fields.
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