Published 9 April 2026

Silicon shortages silently erode yield and disease resistance

Silicon shortages silently erode yield and disease resistance. Yet, it is one of the most under-utilised measurement that can help maximise yields and minimise costs. Silicon is one of the five soil parameters described in this series that each govern distinct biological and chemical processes. These processes directly determine yield, input efficiency, and long-term soil health. Moreover, they are deeply interconnected. This means that an integrated measurement and management approach of all five is even more beneficial. Start saving and gaining at the same time today by measuring these five critical soil elements together

Key Take Aways

These key take aways give you a quick overview so you can maximise yields and minimise costs without delay.

Soil Silicon

Silicon is the most underutilised measurement on this list. Nonetheless, for cereals, rice, and sugarcane, its depletion silently erodes yield and disease resistance across successive seasons. Silicon management generates returns across at least four cost centres simultaneously: improved phosphorus mobilisation, suppressed pathogen and pest pressure, enhanced water retention, and stronger crop resilience. This makes silicon a single measurement that unlocks savings across the entire farm system. (35,37,40)
The gains are also self-reinforcing. Recycling crop straw to rebuild biogenic amorphous silica pools sustains high silicon availability long-term at near-zero ongoing cost. As such you can progressively reduce dependence on synthetic inputs. (40)

The Integrated Approach

Silicon also forms part of an interconnected system where each soil element enables or sabotages the performance of the others. Measuring multiple elements simultaneously transforms separate data points into a coherent picture of farm system function. This holistic view reveals interactions that no single measurement can expose. (Read more) Therefore, at Carbon Asset Solutions we measure simultaneously soil carbon, moisture, silicon, iron and chlorine.

Snapshot of the five critical soil elements to measure

The silicon status determines whether the crop can defend itself against the pests and pathogens that would otherwise consume the yield gains made possible by all the others; even preventing iron toxicity in waterlogged soils.
The return on measuring all five together as displayed in Table 1 below is therefore greater than the sum of their individual parts, and at $30–37 per hectare for a combined measurement of all 5, it is almost certainly the highest-value soil diagnostic investment available to Australian farmers today. For a detailed overview read the Overview Table of the five elements and their savings.
Note: The figures in this article represent estimated ROI ranges drawn from published Australian and international field research, government extension data, and agronomic industry benchmarks. Actual returns vary by crop, region, soil type, and farm management system.
Book a call with our team to explore how we can help you gain these savings today: https://outlook.office.com/book/ConnectCarbonassetsolutionscom@casmrv.com/

Deep Dive: Soil Silicon

Silicon is the fifth critical measurement in this series, that could maximise yields and minimise costs. Silicon has an essential role to play in crops’ yield and in their resilience against stress. Despite its critical importance and its abundance in nature (37), many agricultural soils have increasingly reduced silicon levels. Silicon leaches during heavy rainfalls and is removed with the harvested crops. Without compensating the silicon losses, even in the form of crop residue recycling, soil silicon levels will continue to deplete over time. Global silicon depletion levels are reported at about 210-224 million tonnes per year, leading to significant losses in crop yield and protection against stressors! (35)

1. Soil Health

Soil silicon is a foundational driver of soil health, shaping the chemical interactions, nutrient dynamics, and biological processes that determine long-term soil function. It stimulates legume root nodulation and root exudate excretion, which in turn enriches the soil microbiome and enhances soil organic carbon dynamics. These outcomes collectively improve the soil’s water holding capacity, nutrient availability, and the soil’s natural suppression of pests and disease. (35, 36, 37)

Soil silicon is a foundational driver of soil health

Despite silicon being one of the most abundant elements in the Earth’s crust, plant-available silicon is rapidly depleted through crop uptake and leaching, particularly in lighter and sandy soils where weathering reserves are limited. Removal rates vary significantly by crop: rice and sugarcane are the heaviest consumers at approximately 500 kg/ha/yr and 300 kg/ha/yr respectively, while mid-range cereals, including wheat, maize, soybean, barley, and sorghum, extract between 50–250 kg/ha/yr. (35)

Without routine monitoring of silicon levels before and after cropping, these deficits accumulate silently, progressively undermining both soil health and yield potential, making silicon measurement an essential, if overlooked, tool for genuinely regenerative farming. (35)

2. Productivity

Silicon delivers a dual productivity advantage: it directly boosts yield while simultaneously building the soil carbon stocks that underpin long-term farm resilience. These benefits grow more valuable as climate pressures intensify. (36) In silicon-accumulating crops such as cereals, rice, sugarcane, wheat, and barley, silicon strengthens root and shoot function, improves nutrient use efficiency, and optimises canopy architecture. (35) Globally, silicon additions have driven relative wheat yield increases of 4–100%, primarily through enhanced photosynthesis, nutrient uptake, and biomass accumulation. (35, 36)

Silicon delivers a dual productivity advantage

Silicon also acts as a nutrient retention mechanism: in sandy soils across the USA, applying silicon-rich materials reduced the leaching of nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, and ammonium by 21–78%, directly improving fertiliser efficiency. (35) Therefore, we recommend to complement your traditional NPK testing with our measurement technology, which measures silicon along other elements (read more).

These yield gains are most pronounced where plant-available silicon is low, or crops are already under moderate abiotic or biotic stress. Precisely these conditions are becoming more common under a changing climate, making silicon management increasingly relevant to closing the yield gap. (35, 36)

3. Resilience

Silicon stands out as one of the most comprehensively documented nutrients for improving both abiotic and biotic stress resilience in crops. (35, 37) It enhances spike loading and grain filling, boosting grain weight while strengthening drought tolerance through improved water relations, antioxidant activity, and photosynthetic gas exchange. (35) Deposited in plant cell walls, silicon acts as a physical barrier against pathogen infiltration while simultaneously activating the plant’s own defence mechanisms, measurably reducing the severity of a broad range of diseases. (35, 37)

Silicon stands out as one of the most comprehensively documented nutrients for improving both abiotic and biotic stress resilience in crops.

Silicon also mediates tolerance to heavy metal toxicity across multiple crops and metals, including aluminium in barley and corn, arsenic in rice, cadmium in corn, rice, and peanut, lead in cotton, cowpea, and cucumber, and zinc in corn. It does this partly by forming immobile silicates that prevent plant uptake, and partly through structural tissue deposits that block toxic metal absorption; a comparable mechanism also suppresses iron toxicity in waterlogged soils such as rice paddies. (37) Under salt stress, silicon improves potassium uptake and translocation by stimulating the hormones that govern osmotic adjustment. (35)

Where soil silicon is deficient, crops lose this natural buffering capacity against toxic elements such as aluminium and manganese, and nutrient cycling in the rhizosphere is disrupted. (35, 37) Silicon-adequate crops maintain cellular function during stress events, recover faster, and suffer measurably less yield loss in adverse seasons. Therefore, declining soil silicon balances directly erode yield potential. This makes soil silicon status a critical but frequently overlooked variable in whole-farm resilience. (35, 37)

4. Input Cost Reduction

Measuring and managing soil silicon leads to an accumulation of reduced input costs. By competing with phosphorus for binding sites on soil particles, silicon mobilises previously unavailable soil phosphorus, meaning farmers could progressively reduce purchased P fertiliser inputs. (40)

Silicon management represents a rare opportunity to simultaneously reduce input costs across fertiliser, pesticide, and irrigation

Where silicon is sufficient, its documented suppression of fungal pathogens and insect herbivores, as mentioned above, through both physical tissue deposits and activated plant defence mechanisms offers a direct pathway to reduced pesticide expenditure. (40)

Meanwhile, the improvement in soil water holding capacity driven by amorphous silica, where a 1% increase in soil amorphous silica content has been shown to improve plant-available water by more than 40%, reduces yield losses during drought events that are projected to cost European farmers up to 25% of yield under a changing climate. (40)

Taken together, silicon management represents a rare opportunity to simultaneously reduce input costs across fertiliser, pesticide, and irrigation expenditure, while building the soil resilience that protects farm revenue through increasingly volatile seasons. Crucially, these gains are self-reinforcing: recycling crop straw to rebuild biogenic amorphous silica pools can sustain high silicon availability in the long term with minimal ongoing cost, progressively reducing dependence on synthetic inputs. (40)

5. Return of Investment

The return on investment of measuring and managing soil silicon is high because its benefits compound across multiple farm systems simultaneously. A single silicon measurement, taken before and after cropping, unlocks a cascade of management decisions: from targeted silicon amendments that rebuild soil water holding capacity and reduce drought-related yield losses, to informed choices that progressively reduce fertiliser and pesticide expenditure. (35, 36, 37)

The investment required to begin this cycle is modest.

Unlike many single-purpose soil interventions, silicon management generates returns across at least four cost centres at once. Adequate silicon levels can improve phosphorus mobilisation reducing fertiliser spend. They can suppress pathogen and pest pressure reducing pesticide use. Further they can enhance water retention reducing the yield penalty of drought. And finally, stronger crop resilience narrows the gap between potential and realised yield in difficult seasons. (35, 37, 40)

Crucially, the investment required to begin this cycle is modest: soil testing, targeted silicon amendment, and straw recycling represent low-cost entry points that progressively become self-financing as soil silicon pools rebuild and input dependency declines. (40) In a farming environment defined by rising input costs, tightening margins, and increasingly volatile seasons, silicon measurement may well be the highest-return soil diagnostic a farmer is not yet running.

Traditional soil testing does not often include silicon. However, it has the potential to quietly undermine or enforce all the others. Therefore, Carbon Asset Solutions provides integrated measurement of multiple soil health indicators, including silicon, for the low cost of $30-37 per hectare.

6. Measuring all five together matters more

More important than measuring silicon on its own, is understanding its interaction with other elements (read more). Soil carbon, moisture, iron, chloride, and silicon do not operate in isolation. They shape, constrain, and amplify each other in ways that make the combined measurement of all five exponentially more valuable than measuring any one alone. As you can read here.

Silicon’s Interactions

Silicon, for example, directly suppresses the iron toxicity that waterlogging triggers in rice paddies by forming immobile silicates that prevent toxic iron uptake. (37) It also competes with phosphorus for binding sites on soil particles, mobilising the previously unavailable P that iron oxides were locking up; the same P pool that iron measurement is needed to track. (35,40)

In sandy soils, where both silicon and phosphorus leach rapidly, silicon additions have reduced NPK and ammonium leaching by 21–78%, directly protecting the fertiliser investment that carbon and moisture management is designed to make more efficient. (35) These are not theoretical interactions; they are documented, quantified, and occurring on farms where only two or three of the five parameters are currently being measured.

Financial implications

The financial implication of this interconnectedness is direct. Measuring iron without silicon means addressing P availability without knowing whether silicon could mobilise more P at lower cost, or whether silicon depletion is already eroding the pathogen resistance that keeps disease from consuming the yield.

At a combined measurement cost of $30–37 per hectare, the five-in-one measurement offered by Carbon Asset Solutions does not just provide five data points. It provides the integrated diagnostic framework that makes each individual measurement more actionable, more interpretable, and ultimately more financially valuable. The five elements measured together reveal the farm system as it actually functions, not as a collection of independent variables, but as an interconnected biological and chemical system where the return on understanding the whole is greater than the sum of knowing the parts.

Find out about the five critical things about your soil and become more resilient, sustainable and productive. Book a call with our team to explore how we can help you gain these savings: https://outlook.office.com/book/ConnectCarbonassetsolutionscom@casmrv.com/