Mixture of sewage sludge with organic garbage was alternatively composted by aerobic and anaerobic technology for 60 days. A basin-scale experiment was performed by planting watercress with kailyard (KY) soil amended with the compost. The results show that average total organic carbon (TOC) increases from 98.45% to 787.69%, and average total nitrogen (TN), total phosphorus (TP) and total potassium (TK) increases to 98.53%, 27.34%, and 41.62%, respectively. The results of watercress in 6 pot experiments with a control treatment show that biomass production increases from 76.47% to 312.00% with the increase of addition of compost from 50 g to 150 g per pot but decreases from 312.00% to 102.29% with the addition of compost to soil and further increases from 150 g to 400 g per pot. The optimal amount of compost added to KY soil is 0.4 g of compost 1 kg of KY soil. Heavy metals accumulated by watercress demonstrate that Cu, Ni, Cd, Pb, Cr, Zn in the crop are much lower than the limited levels of Chinese criteria for vegetables. KY soil is proper to be amended with compost of sewage sludge without threat of bio-magnification of heavy metals to planting watercress. (C) 2010 Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of The Institution of Chemical Engineers.