CHAPTER FIVE Mineral nutrition of cassava G. Byju*, G. Suja ICAR-Central Tuber Crops Research Institute, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India *Corresponding author: e-mail address: byju.g@icar.gov.in Contents 1. Introduction 170 1.1 Cassava production 171 1.2 Cassava plant 175 2. Cassava productivity 177 2.1 Crop characteristics 178 2.2 Climate 179 3. Soil requirements 181 4. Nutrient requirements 190 5. Methods of fertilizer recommendations for cassava 196 5.1 Blanket fertilizer recommendations 197 5.2 Targeted yield approach 200 5.3 Leaf color chart and SPAD-502 meter based real time N management 202 5.4 Site-specific nutrient management 203 5.5 Method and timing of fertilizer application 216 5.6 Drip fertigation 217 6. Organic vs inorganic nutrition of cassava 218 7. Knowledge gaps and recommended research 222 8. Conclusions 224 Acknowledgments 224 References 224 Abstract Cassava is an important tropical root crop with versatile uses in food, feed, green energy and industrial sectors. It is grown mostly for food in Sub-Saharan Africa, food and other uses in Latin America and feed and other uses in Asia. The current global level of pro- ductivity of about 12 t/ha is only 12% of its potential productivity. Major reasons for the wide yield gap are lack of scientific nutrient management and unbalanced crop nutri- tion. In this review, we update the gap in cassava productivity, soil requirements, nutri- ent requirements and evolution of fertilizer recommendations and its impact on bridging the yield gap. Research work on mineral nutrition of cassava, especially in Asia and Latin America is aplenty. Among the major nutrients, cassava removes large quan- tity of potassium along with the harvested produce compared to the other nutrients. The range of critical levels of P and K reported for cassava was lower than the Advances in Agronomy, Volume 159 # 2020 Elsevier Inc. ISSN 0065-2113 All rights reserved. https://doi.org/10.1016/bs.agron.2019.08.005 169