The amount of nutrients that plants remove from the soil during development period is expressed as the amount of nutrients taken. Some of these nutrients can be reused either by storing them in the plant or by mixing plant parts into the soil, while some of them can be removed irreversibly with harvested fruits or plant parts removed from the land. This is defined as the amount of nutrients removed.

While the amount of nutrient uptake depends on the amount of nutrients used in the metabolism of plants, the amount of nutrients removed is directly related to the nutrient content of the material moved away from the land.

While perennial plants cater for their nutrient needs from their own existing reserves, annual plants have to take almost all of their needs from soil. This situation should be taken into consideration in fertilization.

In fertilization, it is aimed to restore the amount of nutrients that are permanently removed from soil. If this is not achieved, soil fertility will inevitably decrease over time. In order to maintain sustainable agricultural production and soil fertility, it is necessary to know the amount of nutrients that the cultivated plant takes and removes from the soil and to fertilize accordingly. The nutrients that some plants take or remove from soil are shown below.