SIR SITARAM & LADY SHANTBAI PATKAR COLLEGE OF ARTS & SCIENCE

AND
V.P. VARDE COLLEGE OF COMMERCE & ECONOMICS
S.V. ROAD, GOREGAON (WEST), MUMBAI-400062
B.Com (Banking & Insurance )
Soil degradation
NAME – SNEHA SUBHASH SHIRISHKAR

.ROLL NO – 583

SUBJECT – FOUNDATION COURSE

CLASS – SYBBI
SUBJECT TEACHER – MS. AKSHATA RANAVADE
 INDEX

SR. NO. PARTICULARS

1 INTRODUCTION and MEANING

2 TYPES OF SOIL DEGRADATION

3 CAUSES OF SOIL DEGRADATION

4 IMPACT OF SOIL DEGRADATION

5 SUSTAINABLE SOIL MANAGEMENT : PRINCIPLES

6 CASE STUDY

7 CONCLUSION

.
INTRODUCTION OF SOIL DEGRADATION

Soil is a habitat and gene pool, serves as a platform for human activities,
landscape and heritage, and acts as a provider of raw materials. A healthy, fertile
soil is at the heart of food security. These functions are worthy of protection
because of their socio‐economic as well as environmental importance.
Current information suggests that, over recent decades, soil degradation has
increased and will increase further if no action is taken. Soil degradation is driven
or exacerbated by human activity and projected climate change, together with
individual extreme weather events which are becoming more frequent, is likely to
have also negative effects on soil.
Eight major aspects of soil degradation in Europe have been identified including
biodiversity decline, contamination, erosion and organic matter decline.
All these problems have considerable economic and environmental consequences
and could eventually compromise food production. In this context, the JRC’s
European Soil Bureau Network has therefore established a Working Group on
Public Awareness and Educational Initiatives for Soil.
Soil degradation is the decline in soil condition caused by its improper use or poor
management, usually for agricultural, industrial or urban purposes. It is a serious
environmental problem. Soils are a fundamental natural resource, and are the
basis for all terrestrial life. Avoiding soil degradation is crucial to our well-being.

MEANING OF SOIL DEGRADATION

Soil degradation is the physical, chemical and biological decline in soil quality. It
can be the loss of organic matter, decline in soil fertility, and structural condition,
erosion, adverse changes in salinity, acidity or alkalinity, and the effects of toxic
chemicals, pollutants or excessive flooding.
TYPES OF SOIL DEGRADATION :

 Following are the Main types of Soil Degradation :

1 . Chemical Degradation
2. Physical Degradation
3 . Biological Degradation

1. CHEMICAL DEGRADATION
Loss of nutrients or organic Matter :
1 ) The removals of nutrients reduce the capacity of soils to support plant growth .
2) Decrease the soil fertility .
3) Decrease the crop yields .
4 ) Hardening of iron and aluminium rich clay soils into hardpans .
5) The reduction of soils nutrients may be due to acidity or water logging .

Acidification
Acidification refers to a reduction in the pH of the ocean over an extended period
of time, caused primarily by uptake of carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere.
… These changes in ocean chemistry can affect the behavior of non-calcifying
organisms as well.

SALINIZATION
  Soil salinity is the salt content in the soil , the process of increasing the salt
content is know as the SALINIZATION .
 Salts occur naturally within soils and water .
 Salinization can be caused by process such as mineral weathering or
irrigation .

ACID SULPHATE SOIL

 Acid sulphate soils are naturally occurring soils , sediment or organic
substrate that are formed under waterlogged condition
 Release of this sulfuric acid form the soil can in turn release iron ,
Aluminum and other heavy metal within the soil .
 Killing vegetation , seeping into and acidifying ground water .

SOIL POLLUTION
 Soil pollution as part of land degradation
 Caused by the presences of human – Made chemical or the other
alterations in the natural soil environment .
 It is typically cause by industrial activities , agriculture chemical , or
improper disposal of waste .

2 . PHYSICAL DEGRADATION
 Water lodging.
· Excessive irrigation on poorly drained soils is waterlogging.

• This occurs (as is common for salinization) in poorly drained soils where
water can’t penetrate deeply.

. For example, there may be an impermeable clay layer below the soil.

• The raised water table results in the soils becoming waterlogged.

  Compacting , sealing , crusting :

• Soil compaction decrease in space between soil particles due to externally

or internally applied loads.

• Soil sealing is the covering of the ground by An impassable material is one

of the main causes of soil degradation.
. • Soil crusting is a thin layer of dense and tough material. Soil crusting is
considerably more Compacted and packed than the underlying material .
 Increase runoff, decrease infiltration of water.

 Lowering of water table .

The water table is the level below the surface of the ground where water
can be found. Environmentalists say that diverting water from the river will
lower the water table

 Mining and Urbanization .

• Surface mining requires the removal of topsoil to get at the valuable rocks
below which cause soil degradation.

 Increased urbanization due population growth reduces the agricultural

land.

• Therefore, urbanization leads to deforestation which in-turn affects

Millions of plant and animal species.

3. BIOLOGICAL DEGRADATION
Biological degradation can be defined as the decay that results from organisms
such as fungi and bacteria performing in the presence of excess moisture and air
for an extended period of
• Affect soil micro flora and fauna also reduce the biological or microbial activity
of soil adversely.

• Reduce the yield.

• Applications of some pesticide chemicals which inhibit nitrification.

• Disposal of oil shales, heavy metal contamination of soil and spillage of crude
oils adversely affect soil micro flora.

CAUSES OF SOIL DEGRADATION

. The loss of farm land has been caused by a number of factors, many or most of
which are tied to human development. The primary causes are:

Deforestation
Overgrazing
Overexploitation for fuelwood
Agricultural activities
Increased flooding
Industrialization.
On the global basis, the soil degradation is caused primarily by overgrazing (35%),
agricultural activities (28%), deforestation (30%), overexploitation of land to
produce fuelwood (7%), and industrialization (4%).

6.2 million sq. mi (16 million sq. km) are currently used to grow crops — an
amount of land about equal to the size of South America — while 11.6 million sq.
mi (30 million sq. km) has been set aside for pastureland, an area equal to the
entire African continent. Altogether that's more than 40% of the dry land on the
planet. We use 60 times more land to grow and raise food than we do to live on.
Farming takes half the world's available freshwater, much of which is used for
irrigation. And all that activity — plus the deforestation and degradation that
tends to go hand in hand with farming — helps make agriculture the single
biggest source of manmade greenhouse gasses, more than industry or
transportation or electricity generation.

Soil degradation is the physical, chemical and biological decline in soil quality. It
can be the loss of organic matter, decline in soil fertility, and structural condition,
erosion, adverse changes in salinity, acidity or alkalinity, and the effects of toxic
chemicals, pollutants or excessive flooding. Soil degradation can involve:

 Water erosion (includes sheet, rill and gully erosion)

 Wind erosion
 Salinity (includes dryland, irrigation and urban salinity)
 Loss of organic matter
 Fertility decline
 Soil acidity
Soil contamination (including effects of toxic chemicals and pollutants).
IMPACT OF SOIL DEGRADATION
  The effect of soil degradation is not detected as serious global
problem up to 2020. But, its localized effect is serious affecting food
supply and production in poor and marginal areas with low income.

 Cumulative effect of soil degradation is a serious problem.

 Cost of degradation
•5-10% production loss (light degradation) 20% production loss
(moderate degradation).
•75% Production severe degradation).
•Even 100% in severe condition.

 Effect of soil degradation in food production system combines

with the land management techniques, use of fertilizers,
irrigation and machinery uses.

 Degradation makes Soil irresponsive to inputs, reduce alterative

use of land, failure of irrigation scheme, and reduce water use
efficiency.

SUSTAINABLE SOIL MANAGEMENT : PRINCIPLES

Five Basic Principles:

• Maintain Soil Livestock: They recycle nutrients and many other benefits!

• Organic matter (OM) is food for the soil microbes.

Cover the soil (Mulching): You may loose nutrients due to erosion and
temperature extremes.

• Minimum or No Tillage: It speeds the organic matter decomposition.

• Maintain Nitrogen in Soil: Higher nitrogen (N) in soil means higher

decomposition of organic matters and vice versa. Also, Low N starves plant.

• OM degradation should be less than its addition to maintain the soil fertility. Soil
Fertility should be in acceptable level before doing agriculture.

Case study

Soil erosion is the main soil degradation type; therefore, the

extent of water-induced soil erosion in the state has been
computed on the basis of soil resource map of the state. The
data indicated that about 22 % of TGA of the state has annual
soil loss less than 5 t ha−1, and this can be termed as very well
within the tolerance limit. This area does not require any
specific soil conservation measures. Improved land and crop
production technologies need to be adopted for improving the
productivity on sustainable basis. These areas are distributed in
small patches in the entire state. About 7 and 5 % areas are
experiencing annual soil loss in the range of 5.0–10.0 and 10.0–
15.0 t ha−1, respectively. While slight erosion (5–10 t ha−1)
class has been termed as within safe limit, yet this along with
moderate erosion (10.0–15.0 t ha−1) class needs appropriate
conservation measures to sustain the agricultural production
from these areas of the state. These areas can be rehabilitated
by adoption of low-input soil conservation measures, viz. land
shaping, contour farming, field bunding, conservation tillage
and introduction of erosion-resistant crops or cropping
sequences. About 27 % area of the state has soil loss >15 t
ha−1, and it includes moderately severe (15–20 t ha−1), severe
(20–40 t ha−1), very severe (40–80 t ha−1) and extremely
severe class (>80 t ha−1) having 3.75 %, 7.40 %, 5.74 % and
10.08 % area, respectively. These areas are concentrated in
patches in the entire state, but no area of extremely severe
erosion class is present in Hamirpur and Bilaspur districts. It has
been deduced that the state experiences a total soil
displacement to the tune of 258 M tonnes, out of which 83 % is
contributed by 10 % area subjected to extremely severe erosion
class. This area has been delineated in the map, and effective
conservation measures here can not only cause marked
reduction in soil loss but can pave way for regeneration of areas
under other erosion classes.

Conclusion

Soils degradation are the basis for the production of food. The
area of arable land is limited. Given the growing world
population and the area of soils that are already degraded,
sustainable land management is crucial. Sanitation practices
that reuse nutrients and organic matter present in wastewater
and excreta could contribute largely to sustainable soil
management, as they are not only able to balance nutrient
losses, but also replenish organic substances that are lost
through harvesting.