Commercial Humic and Humic-Based Products: Quality Parameters and Legislative Regulations

In agriculture HS and HS-based products (solid and liquid) are generally used in plant nutrition: their role in increasing bioavailability of nutrients and biological activities is well supported in scientific literature. For a proper use of HS it’s fundamental to know their elemental composition as well as some basic features. In commercial products such data are often lacking. The main reason is that at national and especially at international level (EC Regulation n. 2003/2003) the specific rules, up to date, neglected HS. In fact, it must be kept in mind that even the recent European Regulation 2003/2003 (EC Regulation n. 2003/2003) has completely neglected organic and organic-based fertilizers and amendments. At the best the existing rules require the declaration of total content of organic and humic carbon (Ministerio de la Presidencia, 2005). Among others, the Italian Legislative decree 75/2010 (Decreto Legislativo 29 aprile 2010 n. 75) is one of the most advanced in Europe from this point of view (Table 1). The need of standardization and regulations of commercial humic and humic-based products is imperative in a modern agriculture and for a market globalization.