The law of the minimum was given by Liebig in

The law of the minimum was given by Liebig in 1862.
This law states that the growth is dictated not by total resources available, but by the scarcest resource which is also referred to as a limiting factor. It was found that increasing the number of plentiful nutrients did not increase the plant growth, only by increasing the amount of the limiting nutrient, did the growth of the crop was improved.