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Soil resources - The basis of human society and the environment
Abstract
Operational advances, following the European Soil Thematic Strategy after 2002, such as new approaches in soil research, aiming at bridging between science on one side, and politics and decision making on the other side, are described, including the DPSIR approach to soils, which facilitates new forms of inter-disciplinary co-operation. Moreover, main research clusters necessary for such endeavours are described in detail. Finally, some remarks introduce the three following scientific papers, which deal with the relationship between society, soil and land use in the historical and current context.
... In low fertile soil, degradation process can reduce the soil's ability to produce crops or biomass for livestock and human beings (El Baroudy 2011). Soil is non-renewable, it is a limited resource (Blum 2006), and it continuously undergoes degradation process (Bai et al. 2008) which reduces the fertility status of the soil. Due to this, the potential of soil is reduced for crop production, and it endangers the people of the country who completely depend on agricultural resources. ...
... Degraded soil has low fertility and is a much more serious problem in the tropics than in temperate areas, and tropical soils are more degraded because of their climatic conditions and inherent properties (Asioet al. 2009). Globally, climate change enhances land degradation causing low soil fertility (Blum 2006;Seager et al. 2007). Approximately 6 million hectares of cultivated land worldwide annually undergo unproductive due to different processes of degradation (Asio et al. 2009). ...
The industrial revolution has put the soil environment under pollution, pouring a variety of toxic substances into it. These polluting substances include organic and inorganic compounds that pose health risks to human beings via food chain. At present, emphasis has been given to those organic pollutants that sometimes have persistence and reside in soil for a very long time. Major sources of organic pollutants are the agricultural inputs, industrial effluents, fossil fuel burning, and sewage wastes. Several classes of harmful organic pollutants include persistent organic pollutants (POPs), phenols, hexachlorocyclohexanes (HCHs), polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs), and dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethanes (DDTs). Ultimate sink of all these contaminants is water bodies and soil on which growing plants take up a significant portion of these contaminants, but their intratissue fate varies among species. Phytoremediation of the soils contaminated with these organic pollutants is an economical, environment friendly, and efficient technique. Brassica species being famous for their vigorous growth and hyperaccumulator nature have become a subject of extensive investigations regarding their role in accumulation and degradation of pollutants from soil and water bodies. Brassica species can maintain a good and healthy growth that makes tissue dilution of uptaken contaminants and degradation of these intracellular invasive species via modulating cellular physiology and enzymatic machinery. Brassica vigorous roots provide active sites for static adsorption of contaminants from soil and water bodies and release exudates that facilitate growth of contaminant-degrading rhizobacteria. Bacterial brassica partnership has an incremental impact on degradation of organic pollutants so does application of immobilizing organic and inorganic amendments. Once uptaken, these contaminants are converted into sulfur-containing compounds inside Brassica body that make dry tissue of Brassica species an excellent fuel leading their use for energy generation under biofumigation process. This chapter is an effort to give a comprehensive review on the fate of organic pollutants in the environment and the role of Brassica species in environmental cleansing via phytoremediation.
... Soil is a limited resource that provides a unique habitat for a large variety of organisms including soil microorganisms. One gram of soil can contain one billion of bacteria and one million of fungi that support a range of processes with impacts at the global scale (Blum, 2006;. They contribute to ecosystem functions such as food supply, water quality, carbon cycling, climate regulation, and pollutant degradation , whose annual economic value is estimated to be around 1.3 trillion Euros (Pimentel et al., 1997). ...
... Soil is a limited and largely non-renewable resource providing a unique and complex habitat for a wide range of microorganisms supporting soil ecosystem functions contributing to complex processes with impacts at the global scale (Blum, 2006. For instance, soil microorganisms contribute to food supply, water quality, carbon cycling, and climate regulation ). ...
... In low fertile soil, degradation process can reduce the soil's ability to produce crops or biomass for livestock and human beings (El Baroudy 2011). Soil is non-renewable, it is a limited resource (Blum 2006), and it continuously undergoes degradation process (Bai et al. 2008) which reduces the fertility status of the soil. Due to this, the potential of soil is reduced for crop production, and it endangers the people of the country who completely depend on agricultural resources. ...
... Degraded soil has low fertility and is a much more serious problem in the tropics than in temperate areas, and tropical soils are more degraded because of their climatic conditions and inherent properties (Asioet al. 2009). Globally, climate change enhances land degradation causing low soil fertility (Blum 2006;Seager et al. 2007). Approximately 6 million hectares of cultivated land worldwide annually undergo unproductive due to different processes of degradation (Asio et al. 2009). ...
Land degradation is a serious threat to agriculture which is adversely affecting the soil functions and productivity, while degraded soils stretch up to 6 billion ha worldwide. The population of the world is increasing day by day and agricultural land is declining due to degradation. It is estimated that 30% of forestry, 20% of agricultural land, and 10% of rangeland are severely affected by land degradation. Agriculture land is being degraded due to many reasons like deforestation, mining, misuse of fertilizers, and use of industrial water for irrigation purposes. This damage to ecosystem can be countered by adopting several soil restoration strategies. Major factors in land degradation which contribute to damaging the soil plant system are soil erosion, salt affectedness, decline in soil fertility and soil heavy metals contamination. Soil erosion can be minimized/controlled by afforestation, use of timber alternate, controlling the flow of water by growing cover crops, managing agricultural intensification and urban sprawl. Saline soils can be rehabilitated by growing salt-resistant crops, ploughing the salt-affected field deeply, and mixing of soil horizon. Chemically, reclamation of saline soils is also an option involving organic and inorganic amendments which can make salt-affected soils capable of giving a sustainable production. Different agronomic practices can also be followed to aid the soil rehabilitation and to increase crop productivity. Nutritional status of the soil can be improved by applying fertilizers, growing leguminous crops, green manuring, employing zero tillage practices, and crop rotation. Heavy metal contamination is one of the most severe degradation threats which can be minimized by using remediation techniques, organic and inorganic amendments, and phytoremediation. By adopting these strategies, degraded soils can be restored, and the world’s agriculture economic losses due to land degradation can be minimized.
... The Human society is facing multiple challenges, including an estimated population increase by 2.5 billion from 2015 to 2050, increased energy consumption, a combination of expanding agricultural land use on the one hand and loss of most productive agricultural land to non-food production land use types on the other hand, while furthermore, facing increased climate variability and global warming (Blum, 2006, Valujeva et al., 2016. According to a prediction done by the United Nations the global agricultural production must grow by 60% to feed the world population (WWDR, 2015). ...
... According to a prediction done by the United Nations the global agricultural production must grow by 60% to feed the world population (WWDR, 2015). Soil is one of the key resources that help society to face these challenges, while being itself under heavy pressure (Blum, 2006). It is estimated that about a quarter of all agricultural soils are degraded, therefore their future potential for biomass productivity has decreased and still decreases (Conijn et al., 2013). ...
According to predictions by the United Nations global agricultural production must grow by 60% to feed the world population. Soil is one of the key natural resources that enable us to manage this challenge. Primary productivity is one out of five soil functions (water purification, carbon sequestration, habitat for biodiversity, recycling of nutrients/agro-chemicals) and it is defined as the capacity of soil to supply nutrients and water and to produce plant biomass for human use. If soils are not managed sustainably they lose their productivity function for the long-term, if not permanently. It is estimated that about a quarter of all agricultural soils are degraded, therefore their future potential for biomass productivity decreases. Primary productivity depends on many factors. The main factors are geographic location as well as land and soil management. The LANDMARK primary productivity model considers additionally inherent soil attributes (physical, chemical, biological). Agricultural soils do not only need to fulfil their primary productivity function but at the same time sustain other soil functions such as water regulation and purification as well as carbon sequestration and climate regulation. To maintain all functions simultaneously is difficult and depends on the agronomical and environmental interests. Abiotic (e.g. climate) and biotic (e.g. soil organisms) factors have an influence on primary productivity. Therefore, land use management and agricultural management are important. Crop rotation and cover crops can have a positive effect on primary productivity. Also, the preceding crop and type, rate, timing and placement of fertiliser applied have an impact on the primary productivity of the crop being cultivated. For grassland soils, soil N mineralisation potential, soil fertility, nutrient application, soil structural quality and trafficability, grazing animal stocking rate and grazing management are important. On each level (local, regional and European) different tasks must be fulfilled. Farmers have to be aware about the impacts of agricultural practices on soil functions.
... From an agricultural perspective, land degradation is defined as the reduction in soil capacity to produce crops or biomass for human beings and livestock (El Baroudy 2011). Soil is a limited resource that is considered non-renewable (Blum 2006), and it is continuously exposed to degradation processes (Bai et al. 2008). Production potential can be declined by land degradation, and it endangers the rural people of a country who mostly depend on agriculture for their livelihoods. ...
... Soil degradation is much more serious in tropics than in temperate areas since tropical soils are more prone to degradation because of their inherent properties and the prevalent climatic conditions (Asio et al. 2009). Global climate change is acting as a triggering factor of land degradation (Blum 2006;Seager et al. 2007). Annually, about 6 million hectares of agricultural land worldwide are becoming unproductive due to various soil degradation processes (Asio et al. 2009). ...
Land degradation in terms of soil degradation is a major environmental issue posing threat to sustainable livelihood in the semi-arid region of Central Myanmar. However, the studies on soil degradation status and its impacts in this region are very scanty. The objective of this study was to determine the impact of land degradation on crop production both in terms of area and yield in the Dry Zone of Myanmar. Remote sensing and geographic information system-based modelling was utilized to assess and map soil erosion rates. Household survey was conducted to understand the causes of land degradation and its impacts on crop productivity and livelihoods. It has been found out that the current rate of soil erosion ranged from 0 to 114 t ha–1 yr–1, and that the average rate of soil erosion increased from 14.2 to 54.6 t ha–1 yr–1 over a period from 2000 to 2012. The major types of land degradation were physical and chemical soil degradation. Farmers identified topographic condition, soil types, improper crop management practices and climatic factors as the main causes of soil erosion. The observed crop yields of monsoon rice, groundnut, sesame and cotton in the highly degraded area were 3–12 times lower compared with the yields of these crops grown in less degraded area. Livelihoods of the farmers in the high-degraded area were affected by crop yield reduction, increased cultivation cost and increased uncultivable land area. The impact of land degradation on crop production was dependent on the severity of degradation. This suggests that advanced conservation measures are immediately required and the supportive policy strategies need to be implemented to educate farmers and to strengthen extension services for sustainable land management in the Dry Zone of Myanmar.
... Sometime this would be inaccurate-classification, if careful attention is not been given during the physical observation in the field and at time of mathematical calculations under CSTE. It must be aware that agricultural surface soils are components of terrestrial soil environment (Muellar et al., 2010) that covered most lands of the earth with different physical nature and dynamic functions (Blum, 2006); therefore, the suitability of agricultural surface soils classification is good to take consideration of many distinct physical soil characteristics under specific agricultural activities as used in this study. In the present classification, the new soil group names are more of agricultural land use surface limitations such as flood plains, irrigated land, dry soils, valley land, millet land, rice land, sandy soil, clayed soils, decomposed organic material soils, sticky soils, moist soils, carbonated soils, coloured soils, deposited soils, transported soils and residual soils. ...
Lack of qualitative information under dynamic surface soil condition has affected the development and proper sustainable management of most agricultural soils globally.
... Soil is fundamental to the sustainable development of human societies. It delivers services that are critical to the sustenance of the socio-economic wellbeing of any nation (Blum et al., 2006;Parikh and James, 2012;Nnabude et al., 2022). However, given its non-renewable status and its rapid degradation, this indispensable resource is currently under threat (Montanarella et al., 2016;Madueke et al., 2019Madueke et al., , 2020Madueke et al., , 2021b. ...
Soil erosion has been identified as one of the most destructive forms of land degradation, posing a threat to the sustainability of global economic, social, and
environmental systems. This underscores the need for sustainable land management that takes erosion control and prevention into consideration. This requires
the use of state-of-the-art erosion prediction models. The models often require extensive input of detailed spatial and temporal data, some of which are not
readily available in many developing countries, particularly detailed soil data. The soil dataset Global Gridded Soil Information (SoilGrids) could potentially
fill the data gap. Nevertheless, its value and accuracy for soil erosion modelling in the humid tropics is still unknown, necessitating the need to assess its value
vis-à-vis field-based data. The major objective of this study was to conduct a comparative assessment of the value of SoilGrids and field-based soil data for
estimating soil loss. Soil samples were collected from five physiographic positions (summit, shoulder, back slope, foot slope, and toe slope) using the soil
catena approach. Samples were collected using a 5-cm steel sample ring (undisturbed) and a spade (disturbed). Data of the landform, predominant vegetation
types, canopy cover, average plant height, land use, soil depth, shear strength, and soil color were recorded for each site. The soil samples were subjected to
laboratory analysis for saturated hydraulic conductivity, bulk density, particle size distribution, and organic matter content. Pedotransfer functions were
applied on the SoilGrids and field-based data to generate soil hydrological properties. The resultant field-based data were compared with the SoilGrids data
for corresponding points/areas to determine the potential similarities of the two datasets. Both datasets were then used as inputs for soil erosion assessment
using the revised Morgan-Morgan-Finney model. The results from both datasets were again compared to determine the degree of similarity. The results
showed that with respect to point-based comparison, both datasets were significantly different. At the hillslope delineation level, the field-based data still
consistently had a greater degree of variability, but the hillslope averages were not significantly different for both datasets. Similar results were recorded with
the soil loss parameters generated from both datasets; point-based comparison showed that both datasets were significantly different, whereas the reverse
was true for parcel/area-based comparison. SoilGrids data are certainly useful, especially where soil data are lacking; the utility of this dataset is, however,
dependent on the scale of operation or the extent of detail required. When detailed, site-specific data are required, SoilGrids may not be a good alternative to
soil survey data in the humid tropics. On the other hand, if the average soil properties of a region, area, or land parcel are required to implement a
particular project, plan, or program, SoilGrids data can be a very valuable alternative to soil survey data.
... Soil is a limited and non-renewable natural resource for the needs of the increasing human population, as well as being the main element in meeting the nutritional and shelter needs of the terrestrial ecosystem (Blum, 2006). As a matter of fact, it is predicted that the world population will grow by 19.7% until 2050 and reach 9.6 billion. ...
In this study, rice land designated for agricultural land suitability indices belonging to the enterprise Yeşil Küre Farm Land with different time series Sentinel-2A satellite images calculated utilizing spectral vegetation index, which are Normalized Difference Vegetation Index and Red Edge Optimized Soil Adjusted Vegetation Index values by statistical comparison of the relationship between rice for monitoring and estimation of potential productivity is presented a different perspective. Firstly, according to the rice suitability assessment for the study area, the area of 5488.9 ha was determined to be suitable for rice cultivation at the S1 and S2 levels, whereas the area of 588.9 ha was determined to be unsuitable. In this study, it was determined that the most successful results for each land conformity class were obtained using the NDVI. In particular, it was determined that August received the highest r2 value (NDVI; 0.8580 and RE-OSAVI; 0.8465) in both vegetation index models at the S1 level, and on the other hand, a higher r2 value was obtained with NDVI.
... Soil is fundamental to the sustainable development of human societies. It delivers services that are critical to the sustenance of the socio-economic wellbeing of any nation (Blum et al., 2006;Parikh and James, 2012). However, given its non-renewable status and its rapid degradation, this indispensable resource is currently under threat (Montanarella et al., 2016;Madueke et al., 2019Madueke et al., , 2020Madueke et al., , 2021. ...
Soil erosion has been identified as one of the most destructive forms of land degradation, posing a threat to the sustainability of global economic, social and environmental systems. This underscores the need for sustainable land management that takes erosion control and prevention into consideration. This requires the use of state-of-the-art erosion prediction models. The models require extensive input of detailed spatial and temporal data, some of which are not readily available in many developing countries, particularly detailed soil data. SoilGrids could potentially fill the data gap. Nevertheless, its value and accuracy for soil erosion modeling in the humid tropics is still unknown, necessitating the need to assess its value vis-à-vis field-based data. The combined supervised hillslope delineation and the topographic parameters provided a better representation of the soil-landscape relationship that is useful for field data collection. The resultant field-based data was compared with the SoilGrids data for corresponding areas to determine the potential similarities of the two datasets. The results show that with respect to point-based comparison, both datasets were significantly different. At the hillslope delineation level, the field-based data still consistently had a greater degree of variability, but the hillslope averages were not significantly different for both datasets. Both datasets were then used as inputs for soil erosion assessment using the Revised Morgan-Morgan-Finney (RMMF) model. The results show that soil loss estimates using SoilGrids data are, in general, a bit higher as compared with that using field-based soil data. SoilGrids data is certainly useful especially where soil data is lacking. But when detailed, site-specific data are required, it may not be a good alternative to field-based data.
... As a dynamic interface between the lithosphere, atmosphere, hydrosphere and biosphere [1], the soil is the region where minerals and organisms interact with air and water moving in and around it, and is considered a limited and non-renewable resource in nature [2]. The phenomenon of soil quality is regarded as a dynamic interaction between various physical, chemical and biological soil properties affected by many external factors such as land management practices and socio-economic priorities [3]. ...
The term of soil quality frequently mentioned in soil science literature in recent years is considered as a soil concept that shows differences in terms of assessment methods according to the aims and conditions, and often subjected to severe criticism in terms of application methods, but expected to play a key role in classic and postmodern agricultural practices. Nowadays, soil problems arising from soil degradation due to various natural or anthropological reasons, especially climate change and infertility of agricultural soils have led to focus on the concept of soil quality in order to determine the effects of land use on soil resources. The concept of soil quality which includes the inherent natural characteristics of the soils and the dynamic characteristics those vary depending on the use is an important indicator showing the reaction of the soil to natural or anthropological effects. Soil quality concept is mostly used for the purpose of crop production and nature conservation in agricultural ecosystems and land use areas such as forest and pasture. In the soil quality studies focused on how to determine soil quality asssessment, there is still no consensus on a certain method that can be accepted as a standard because of the variability of management objectives and related evaluation parameters. However, in the modern concept of soil quality, dynamic soil quality indicators are regarded as valuable tools for identifying and evaluating soil problems, delivering reliable and comparable results in practice, and increasing applications in targeted quality assessments.
... Soil is considered as one of the most important resources for sustainable development and need to be managed wisely and protected timely. [1] , reported that soils cover most lands of the earth, as per their service for humans they are a limited and largely non-renewable resource. [2] further reported that the development and survival of civilizations has been based on the performance of soils on this land to provide food and further essential goods for humans. ...
The study area is one of the areas in the south-south region of Nigeria that has been ravaged by erosion. This has lead loss of infrastructure and has also affected the livelihood of the inhabitant of the study area. In this study, the physiochemical properties of soils in Agbor and its neighboring communities was assessed in eleven different locations. A total of eleven soil samples, consisting of 5 samples each at a depth of 0 – 200 cm were taken in accordance with the clarification of different horizons. The samples were air-dried, crushed and sieved in 2mm mesh sieve then subjected to analysis for both physical and chemical properties in the laboratory. The physiochemical analysis results showed that pH value ranges from 5.0 to 6.3 indicating very strongly acidic to strongly acidic. Bulk density ranged from 1.29 to1.35 indicating a slight increase due to the presence of sand fraction. And low level of porosity which ranged from 49.4 to 50.9. The low obtained from Total Organic Matter (TOM) indicate intense rainfall and constant leaching. The low Ca, Mg, K+ and Na+ values indicate intense rainfall and leaching problems. The values obtained from Al3+, H+, EA and P revealed slight increase and cause of acidity nature across eleven soils test site. The properties showed by all soils revealed that they are vulnerable to weathering, leaching and easy removal by runoff. Therefore, there resistivity is low.
... 'Soil nutrient mining' in croplands is an important driver of cropland degradation in Kenya. According to Blum (2006) soil is a limited resource and could be considered a non-renewable resource . Areas with poor soil fertility and with poor management practices tend to suffer from soil nutrient depletion. ...
Kenya is an agricultural nation, with over 12 million people residing in areas with degraded lands. Unfortunately, the food crop productivity growth in the country has failed to exceed the population growth. The growth of agricultural output in Kenya is constrained by many challenges including soil erosion, low productivity, agro-biodiversity loss, and soil nutrient depletion. Land exploitation devoid of proper compensating investments in soil and water conservation will lead to severe land degradation. This will translate to loss of rural livelihoods, diminished water supplies and threaten the wildlife habitat. This study explores the causes, extent and impacts of land degradation in Kenya, discusses the costs of action versus inaction in rehabilitating degraded lands, and proposes policy options for promoting sustainable land management (SLM). In order to appropriately support SLM, there is a need to account for the total economic value (TEV) of land degradation, i.e. including the value of both provisioning and indirect ecosystem services of land. Using such a TEV approach, findings show that the costs of land degradation due to land use and land cover changes (LUCC) in Kenya reach the equivalent of 1.3 billion USD annually between 2001 and 2009. Moreover, the costs of rangeland degradation calculated through losses in milk and meat production, as well as in livestock live weight decreases reach about 80 million USD annually. Furthermore, the costs of "soil nutrient mining" leading to lower yields for three crops, namely wheat, maize and rice in Kenya were estimated at about 270 million USD annually. The cost of taking action 471 to rehabilitate lands degraded through LUCC is found to be lower than the cost of inaction by 4 times over a 30 year period, i.e. each dollar invested in land rehabilitation is likely to yield four dollars of returns. This may strongly justify the urgent need for taking action against land degradation. Addressing land degradation involves investments in SLM. Our econometric results show that improving access to information on SLM and to the markets (input, output, financial) may likely stimulate investments into SLM by agricultural households.
... Lands are limited a resource, which provides essential support to ecosystems in the world for sustainable agriculture (Blum, 2006;Cronin, 2009;Jankava et al., 2017 andSaeed et al., 2018). Land is includes soil resources, plant, water, microorganisms, microorganisms, landscape, climate, and ecological systems (Moyo, 2000;MEA, 2005 andVlek et al., 2008). ...
... a period of time. It covers most lands of the earth, but regarding its service for humans, soil is a limited and largely non-renewable resource [3]. Therefore, any serious attempt to use land judiciously for agriculture, engineering, urban development, pollution control, e. t. c., must start with the knowledge of the nature, type, and spatial distribution of soils existing in the regions as produced in land resource surveys [7]. ...
The study was conducted using existing soil data from Nawagaon and Maskara Rao watershed boundary in Shaharanpur district, India to assess land capability classes using Remote Sensing and GIS approach. Land sat image was integrated with SRTM DEM for delineation of landforms and analysis of land use/land cover data. The filled SRTM DEM of the study area was extracted at 30 m reso-lution to extract terrain parameters such as elevation, slope and aspect. SRTM DEM was visually interpreted. Three major landforms were identified, namely, 3 landforms – hills, piedmont plains and alluvia plains. These were further delineated according to slope and finally according to vegetation cover to give eight physiographic units. The slope map and aspect map were produced using filed Dem and were classified into nine and two classes respectively. Land use/land cover map was also generated using satellite image for the study area in India. The dominant land use was: dense forest, degraded forest, crop land I, crop land II, scrub/barren, settlement, river, canal and road.
Based on the slope map, land characteristics of each physiographic unit and land capability criteria for land qualities, land capa-bility classes were assigned and were translated into a land capability map. The soils were placed in seven classes (I, II, III, IV, VI, VII and VIII). Both the GIS approach and LCC evaluation using criteria rating of FAO gave the same classes for the mapped soil. The study revealed that soils from the study areas varied with different physiographic unit, therefore soils of the hilly areas should be put to use for nature conservation other than arable production while the lower portion should be cultivated with intensive care for arable crops.
... The cultivated soils are a limited and predominantly nonrenewable resource (Blum 2006). The function of productivity is related to the most usual definition of soil quality as "the capacity of a specific kind of soil to function, within natural or managed ecosystem boundaries, to sustain plant and animal productivity, maintain or enhance water and air quality, and support human health and habitation" (Karlen et al., 1997). ...
Soil quality is a complex functional concept, which cannot be measured directly but only be inferred from both soil characteristics and cultivation practices. Among different approaches used, Soil Quality Index (SQI) is considered to be the most appropriate for quantitative assessment of soil quality. Since, there is no standard method for SQI estimation, the aim of this study is to identify soil quality parameters that could be used for the development of reliable SQI which could be effectively applied in Mediterranean ecosystems.
... This trend was more marked in the microcosm than in the field study. Only slight but significant transient effects of CHL or TCZ were observed in the INTRODUCTION Soil is a limited and largely non-renewable resource providing a unique and complex habitat for a wide range of microorganisms which support key soil ecosystem functions and contribute to complex processes with impacts at the global scale (Blum, 2006;Bondeau et al., 2007;Graham et al., 2016). For instance, soil microorganisms contribute to food supply, water quality, carbon cycling, and climate regulation (Haygarth and Ritz, 2009;Hillel, 2009). ...
Pesticides are intentionally applied to agricultural fields for crop protection. They can harm non-target organisms such as soil microorganisms involved in important ecosystem functions with impacts at the global scale. Within the frame of the pesticide registration process, the ecotoxicological impact of pesticides on soil microorganisms is still based on carbon and nitrogen mineralization tests, despite the availability of more extensive approaches analyzing the abundance, activity or diversity of soil microorganisms. In this study, we used a high-density DNA microarray (PhyloChip) and 16S rDNA amplicon next-generation sequencing (NGS) to analyze the impact of the organophosphate insecticide chlorpyrifos (CHL), the phenyl-urea herbicide isoproturon (IPU), or the triazole fungicide tebuconazole (TCZ) on the diversity and composition of the soil bacterial community. To our knowledge, it is the first time that the combination of these approaches are applied to assess the impact of these three pesticides in a lab-to-field experimental design. The PhyloChip analysis revealed that although no significant changes in the composition of the bacterial community were observed in soil microcosms exposed to the pesticides, significant differences in detected operational taxonomic units (OTUs) were observed in the field experiment between pesticide treatments and control for all three tested pesticides after 70 days of exposure. NGS revealed that the bacterial diversity and composition varied over time. This trend was more marked in the microcosm than in the field study. Only slight but significant transient effects of CHL or TCZ were observed in the microcosm and the field study, respectively. IPU was not found to significantly modify the soil bacterial diversity or composition. Our results are in accordance with conclusions of the Environmental Food Safety Authority (EFSA), which concluded that these three pesticides may have a low risk toward soil microorganisms.
... Soils are limited resource and could be considered non renewable (Blum, 2006); it is continuously exposed to degradation processes (Bai et al. 2008). The cultivated land represents about 40 -50 % of the global (Smith et al., 2007), 20 % of them are severely degraded (Adams & Eswaran, 2000;and Davis & Masten, 2003). ...
This study aims to address the impact of degradation processes on the soil productivity in the irrigated agriculture east of the Nile Delta. The study area extends between longitudes 31°20' and 32° 15' E & latitudes 29° 54' and 31° 12' N. The preliminary landforms of the area were delineated by using remote sensing data. The area includes flood plain, fluvio-lacustrine and aeolian deposits as main landforms. A semi detailed survey was carried out in order to verify landform units and collecting soil samples. Historical data of year 1975 have been used with the data extracted from current work to assess the land degradation hazard and soil productivity. Results indicate that the degradation processes are sweeping the investigated soils, where 69.73 % of the area has been degraded during the period of 1975 - 2011. During the same period the soil productivity was shifted from low to high grade only in 30.27% of the total area. The main degradation processes overcome the study area are soil salinity, alkalinity, water logging and compaction. The agriculture development in the area requires improved drainage network and proper land management.
... 'Soil nutrient mining' in croplands is an important driver of cropland degradation in Kenya. According to Blum (2006) soil is a limited resource and could be considered a non-renewable resource . Areas with poor soil fertility and with poor management practices tend to suffer from soil nutrient depletion. ...
Kenya is an agricultural nation, with over 12 million people residing in areas with degraded lands. Unfortunately, the food crop productivity growth in the country has failed to exceed the population growth. The growth of agricultural output in Kenya is constrained by many challenges including soil erosion, low productivity, agro-biodiversity loss, and soil nutrient depletion. Land exploitation devoid of proper compensating investments in soil and water conservation will lead to severe land degradation. This will translate to loss of rural livelihoods, diminished water supplies and threaten the wildlife habitat. This study explores the causes, extent and impacts of land degradation in Kenya, discusses the costs of action versus inaction in rehabilitating degraded lands, and proposes policy options for promoting sustainable land management (SLM). In order to appropriately support SLM, there is a need to account for the total economic value (TEV) of land degradation, i.e. including the value of both provisioning and indirect ecosystem services of land. Using such a TEV approach, findings show that the costs of land degradation due to land use and land cover changes (LUCC) in Kenya reach the equivalent of 1.3 billion USD annually between 2001 and 2009. Moreover, the costs of rangeland degradation calculated through losses in milk and meat production, as well as in livestock live weight decreases reach about 80 million USD annually. Furthermore, the costs of “soil nutrient mining” leading to lower yields for three crops, namely wheat, maize and rice in Kenya were estimated at about 270 million USD annually. The cost of taking action to rehabilitate lands degraded through LUCC is found to be lower than the cost of inaction by 4 times over a 30 year period, i.e. each dollar invested in land rehabilitation is likely to yield four dollars of returns. This may strongly justify the urgent need for taking action against land degradation. Addressing land degradation involves investments in SLM. Our econometric results show that improving access to information on SLM and to the markets (input, output, financial) may likely stimulate investments into SLM by agricultural households.
... Soils cover most lands of the earth, but regarding their service for humans they are a limited and largely non-renewable resource (Blum, 2006). On the globe about 3.2 billion hectares are used as arable land, which is about a quarter of the total land area (Scherr, 1999;Davis and Masten, 2003). ...
The development and survival or disappearance of civilizations has been based on the performance of soils to provide food, fibre, and further essential goods for humans. Amongst soil functions, the capacity to produce plant biomass (productivity function) remains essential. This function is closely associated with the main global issues of the 21st century like food security, demands of energy and water, carbon balance and climate change. A standardised methodology for assessing the productivity function of the global soil resource consistently over different spatial scales will be demanded by a growing international community of land users and stakeholders for achieving high soil productivity in the context of sustainable multifunctional use of soils. We analysed available methods for assessing the soil productivity function. The aim was to find potentials, deficiencies and gaps in knowledge of current approaches towards a global reference framework. Our main findings were (i) that the soil moisture and thermal regime, which are climate-influenced, are the main constraints to the soil productivity potential on a global scale, and (ii) that most taxonomic soil classification systems including the World Reference Basis for Soil Resources provide little information on soil functionality in particular the productivity function. We found (iii) a multitude of approaches developed at the national and local scale in the last century for assessing mainly specific aspects of potential soil and land productivity. Their soil data inputs differ, evaluation ratings are not transferable and thus not applicable in international and global studies. At an international level or global scale, methods like agro-ecological zoning or ecosystem and crop modelling provide assessments of land productivity but contain little soil information. Those methods are not intended for field scale application to detect main soil constraints and thereby to derive soil management and conservation recommendations in situ. We found also that (iv) soil structure is a crucial criterion of agricultural soil quality and methods of visual soil assessment like the Peerlkamp scheme, the French method Le profil cultural and the New Zealand Visual Soil Assessment are powerful tools for recognising dynamic agricultural soil quality and controlling soil management processes at field scale. We concluded that these approaches have potential to be integrated into an internationally applicable assessment framework of the soil's productivity function, working from field scale to the global level. This framework needs to serve as a reference base for ranking soil productivity potentials on a global scale and as an operational tool for controlling further soil degradation and desertification. Methods like the multi-indicator-based Muencheberg Soil Quality Rating meet most criteria of such a framework. This method has potential to act as a global overall assessment method of the soil productivity function for cropping land and pastoral grassland but needs further evolution by testing and amending its indicator thresholds.
... Land is the most valuable natural resource for production of food, fuel and many other essential goods that are required to meet human and animal needs [1]. Soils are limited resource and could be considered nonrenewable [2]; it is continuously exposed to degradation processes [3]. Land degradation, defined as a reduction in the biological productivity of land arising from climate change and human activities, is a serious environmental problem [4]. ...
This study aims to assess the land degradation risk in the governorate by using Geographical Information System (GIS) technique. The preliminary landforms of the area were defined by using remote sensing data. The area includes flood plain, lacustrine plain and marine plain. A total of 18 soil profiles representing different mapping units were studied. Thirty six soil samples were collected for laboratory analysis. The soil properties of bulk density and electrical conductivity (EC) were attached to the different landforms. The thematic layers of these properties were created in Arc-GIS 10.2 software using the spatial analysis function and then these layers were matched together to assess the soil degradation. The obtained results revealed that the high risk of physical (i.e. soil compaction) and chemical vulnerability (i.e. salinization) covered an area of 86.02 km2 (12.83%) and 2.28 km2 (0.34%), respectively in the surface soil layers. The land degradation hazard in the surface layers due to soil compaction was moderate to very high, whereas the degree of salinization was low to high. Regarding to the subsurface soil layers, the high risk of physical degradation and chemical degradation covered an area of 127.8 km2 (19.06%) and 10.6 km2 (1.58%), respectively. The land degradation hazard due to soil compaction in the subsurface layers was moderate to high, whereas the degree of salinization was low to very high.
... Sometime this would be inaccurate-classification, if careful attention is not been given during the physical observation in the field and at time of mathematical calculations under CSTE. It must be aware that agricultural surface soils are components of terrestrial soil environment (Muellar et al., 2010) that covered most lands of the earth with different physical nature and dynamic functions (Blum, 2006); therefore, the suitability of agricultural surface soils classification is good to take consideration of many distinct physical soil characteristics under specific agricultural activities as used in this study. In the present classification, the new soil group names are more of agricultural land use surface limitations such as flood plains, irrigated land, dry soils, valley land, millet land, rice land, sandy soil, clayed soils, decomposed organic material soils, sticky soils, moist soils, carbonated soils, coloured soils, deposited soils, transported soils and residual soils. ...
... Soils cover most lands of the earth, but regarding their service for humans they are a limited and largely non-renewable resource (Blum, 2006). On the globe about 3.2 billion hectares are used as arable land, which is about a quarter of the total land area (Scherr, 1999; Davis and Masten, 2003). ...
The development and survival or disappearance of civilizations has been based on the performance of soils to provide food,
fibre, and further essential goods for humans. Amongst soil functions, the capacity to produce plant biomass (productivity
function) remains essential. This function is closely associated with the main global issues of the 21st century like food
security, demands of energy and water, carbon balance and climate change. A standardised methodology for assessing the productivity
function of the global soil resource consistently over different spatial scales will be demanded by a growing international
community of land users and stakeholders for achieving high soil productivity in the context of sustainable multifunctional
use of soils. We analysed available methods for assessing the soil productivity function. The aim was to find potentials,
deficiencies and gaps in knowledge of current approaches towards a global reference framework. Our main findings were (i)
that the soil moisture and thermal regime, which are climate-influenced, are the main constraints to the soil productivity
potential on a global scale, and (ii) that most taxonomic soil classification systems including the World Reference Basis
for Soil Resources provide little information on soil functionality in particular the productivity function. We found (iii)
a multitude of approaches developed at the national and local scale in the last century for assessing mainly specific aspects
of potential soil and land productivity. Their soil data inputs differ, evaluation ratings are not transferable and thus not
applicable in international and global studies. At an international level or global scale, methods like agro-ecological zoning
or ecosystem and crop modelling provide assessments of land productivity but contain little soil information. Those methods
are not intended for field scale application to detect main soil constraints and thereby to derive soil management and conservation
recommendations in situ. We found also, that (iv) soil structure is a crucial criterion of agricultural soil quality and methods
of visual soil assessment like the Peerlkamp scheme, the French method “Le profil cultural” and the New Zealand Visual Soil
Assessment are powerful tools for recognising dynamic agricultural soil quality and controlling soil management processes
at field scale. We concluded that these approaches have potential to be integrated into an internationally applicable assessment
framework of the soil’s productivity function, working from field scale to the global level. This framework needs to serve
as a reference base for ranking soil productivity potentials on a global scale and as an operational tool for controlling
further soil degradation and desertification. Methods like the multi-indicator-based Muencheberg Soil Quality Rating meet
most criteria of such a framework. This method has potential to act as a global overall assessment method of the soil productivity
function for cropping land and pastoral grassland but needs further evolution by testing and amending its indicator thresholds.
Soil degradation results in long-term damage of soil structures which causes income loss tor farmers and has negative ecological and social impacts. The article is based on a case study carried out in the Uckermark region (Brandenburg) that has been conducted as part of the EU research project "Sustainable Agriculture and Soil Conservation" (SoCo). SoCo is aimed at analysing the design and implementation of current political instruments in different EU Member States. In the case study area Uckermark, empirical data have been collected through face-to-face, semi-structured interviews exploring the design, implementation and monitoring of policies for agricultural soil conservation. Both document analysis and interviews indicate that there are deficits in practical soil conservation despite the fact that a range of policies for soil conservation exist. Due to the complex nature of soil degradation it is not possible to link soil conservation effects to individual policies. We therefore base our arguments on the analysis of the requirements of existing instruments and their assessment by local and regional actors. The study shows that the current soil conservation policies only partially address soil degradation issues. This is mainly due to a lack of capacities in the responsible administrations, insufficient design and implementation of the legal requirements, and - in the Uckermark - a lack of regionally adapted incentive schemes. At the same time, the paper provides options for a more effective implementation of soil conservation measures.
The contribution summarises different aspects of the involvement of plants in the water cycle at organism, ecosystem and landscape levels. It stresses the importance of soil – plant – air water continuum for local water cycling and plant adaptations for optimised water management. It discusses the fate of precipitation that depends on vegetation type, stand structure, land use, soil properties and precipitation rate. The possibilities for strengthening local water cycling are also presented.
Poster presented at the 7th Biennial Conference on University Education in Natural Resources. Today’s education, conservation and research in natural resources for both plants and animals focuses on watersheds. Soil has the unique functions of habitat, decomposition of organic material, routing of water, and others. These functions are tied to the spaces among soil solid particles—the holes (pores or voids). But our teaching about soils focuses on the solids. This poster is a suggestion to change our approach, focusing on these spaces and their unique functions.
We report on a Communication of the European Commission to the Council and the European Parliament in 2002, entitled “Towards a Thematic Strategy for Soil Protection”, an operational framework for its implementation and an indicator approach, as a basis for the elaboration of priority research areas for soil protection and the management of Europe's natural resources. From this, we draw the conclusion that soil research should be integrated into comprehensive research areas (e.g., including water and sediments) in order to manage natural resources in Europe.