Impacts of Land Use on Pools and Indices of Soil Organic Carbon and Nitrogen in the Ghaggar Flood Plains of Arid India

Pravash Chandra Moharana, Roshan Lal Meena, Mahaveer Nogiya, Roomesh Kumar Jena, Gulshan Kumar Sharma, Sonalika Sahoo, Prakash Kumar Jha, Kumari Aditi and P. V. Vara Prasad
Additional contact information
Pravash Chandra Moharana: ICAR-National Bureau of Soil Survey and Land Use Planning, Nagpur 440033, India
Roshan Lal Meena: ICAR-National Bureau of Soil Survey and Land Use Planning, Regional Centre, Udaipur 313001, India
Mahaveer Nogiya: ICAR-National Bureau of Soil Survey and Land Use Planning, Regional Centre, Udaipur 313001, India
Roomesh Kumar Jena: ICAR-Indian Institute of Water Management, Bhubaneswar 751023, India
Gulshan Kumar Sharma: ICAR-Indian Institute of Soil and Water Conservation, Research Centre, Kota 324002, India
Sonalika Sahoo: ICAR-Central Inland Fishes Research Institute, Regional Centre, Bengaluru 560089, India
Prakash Kumar Jha: Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Collaborative Research on Sustainable Intensification, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS 66506, USA
Kumari Aditi: Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Collaborative Research on Sustainable Intensification, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS 66506, USA
P. V. Vara Prasad: Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Collaborative Research on Sustainable Intensification, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS 66506, USA

Land, 2022, vol. 11, issue 8, 1-21

Abstract: Changes in land use have several impacts on soil organic carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) cycling, both of which are important for soil stability and fertility. Initially, the study area was barren uncultivated desert land. During the late 1960s, the introduction of a canal in the arid region converted the barren deserts into cultivated land. The objectives of the present study were to evaluate the effects of various land use systems on temporal changes in soil organic C and N pools, and to evaluate the usefulness of different C and N management indices for suitable and sustainable land use systems under arid conditions. We quantified soil organic C and N pools in five different land uses of the Ghaggar flood plains, in hot, arid Rajasthan, India. The study focused on five land use systems: uncultivated, agroforestry, citrus orchard, rice–wheat, and forage crop. These land use systems are ≥20 years old. Our results showed that total organic carbon (TOC) was highest (7.20 g kg −1 ) in the forage crop and lowest in uncultivated land (3.10 g kg −1 ), and it decreased with depth. Across different land uses, the very labile carbon (VLC) fraction varied from 36.11 to 42.74% of TOC. In comparison to the uncultivated system, forage cropping, rice–wheat, citrus orchard, and agroforestry systems increased active carbon by 103%, 68.3%, 42.5%, and 30.6%, respectively. Changes in management and land use are more likely to affect the VLC. In soil under the forage crop, there was a considerable improvement in total N, labile N, and mineral N. Lability index of C (LIC), carbon management index (CMI), and TOC/clay indices were more sensitive to distinguishing land uses. The highest value of CMI was observed in the forage crop system followed by rice–wheat and agroforestry. In the long term, adoption of the forage crop increased soil quality in the hot, arid desert environment by enhancing CMI and VLC, which are the useful parameters for assessing the capacity of land use systems to promote soil quality.

Keywords: carbon and nitrogen pools; soil quality; carbon and nitrogen management index; land use; arid environment (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q15 Q2 Q24 Q28 Q5 R14 R52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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