50. Sustainable Agriculture Through Integrated Soil Fertility Management on Degraded Lands

The use of natural resources to meet people’s requirements, currently and in the future, is sustainable agriculture. In order to uphold the growing rural and urban population in the developing world, considerable development in the efficiency of agricultural systems is required. Intensification of current production systems via increasing cropping intensity and by increased use of external inputs is often the only way to increase agricultural production. However, a major portion of the currently cultivated land is being lost through soil degradation. Degradation includes soil erosion, nutrient depletion, desertification, deforestation, salinization and overgrazing. As agricultural areas become even more crowded, arable land has come under increasing pressure. Agricultural yields are at risk of serious decline as soils are becoming more degraded, putting the livelihoods of millions of subsistence farmers at risk. Integrated soil fertility management (ISFM) is the key in raising productivity levels while maintaining the natural resource base. The main purpose of this integrated approach is to restore soil nutrient pools, maximize on-farm recycling of nutrients, reduce nutrient losses to the environment and improve the efficiency of inputs. Soil fertility can be built up by progressive and steady modification of the natural resources including soils, vegetation and water by crop fallowing, grazing, selecting crop species, deep ploughing to break the plough pan, subsoiling, organic fertilizing, transferring crop residues and fodder. Therefore, ISFM is a viable tool to rebuild the degraded soils. Conclusively, ISFM can play a major role in improving farm output from degraded lands and ultimately in ­sustainable agriculture for the poor farmers.