Soil Salinity and Irrigation Management

This assignment delves into the world of soil salinity and irrigation management, exploring various research papers that discuss techniques for reducing soil salinity and improving water quality. It covers topics such as conservation tillage systems, plant salt-tolerance mechanisms, and brine management technologies for desalination plants. The assignment also touches on the impact of naturally leaking carbon dioxide on soil properties and ecosystems.

Running head: SOIL SALINITY
Soil Salinity
Name of the university
Name of the student
Author Note

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Summary:
This report will discuss about the soil salinity issue in Canada. The report will discuss about the chief
problem that Canada has faced due to salinization. Moreover, the report will discuss three methods to
control salinization and at the end will recommend the best one. At the end, an overall conclusion will be
drawn based on entire discussion.

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Table of Contents
Introduction:................................................................................................................................................3
Chief problems related to agriculture in Canada:.........................................................................................3
Plausible solution to prevent soil salinity:...................................................................................................5
Salt leaching:...........................................................................................................................................5
Pros and cons:.....................................................................................................................................6
Salt tolerant crops:...................................................................................................................................6
Pros and cons:.....................................................................................................................................7
Management of soil salinity:...................................................................................................................8
Pros and cons:.....................................................................................................................................8
Recommendation:........................................................................................................................................8
Conclusion:..................................................................................................................................................9
References:................................................................................................................................................10

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Introduction:
Canada has been facing soil degradation in agricultural sectors since the beginning of this century
due to salinity, acidity, wind and other natural or artificial factors. However, the farmers of this country
have faced this problem recently and for this, those farmers along with official agencies are trying to
control soil quality. Agricultural lands of this country have suffered by waterlogged and flooded farmland
that further increase the amount of saturated salts in soils (Kerr 2017). This soil salinity becomes
inaccessible for farmers to produce more agricultural foods as dissolved components in soil-water
concentration exceed the level of salt requirement of a crop. All kinds of natural waters restrain dissolved
gases and solids that further include some amount of salinity. Development of field crops generally
depends upon dissolved nutrients that soil solutions contain (Ramírez et al. 2017). However, the chief
problem arises when the amount of dissolved salts increases by some amount beyond the requirement
level of plants. Thus, excessive salinity prevents crop production and establishment and increase slow
growth. Hence, this report will discuss about the problems related to agriculture or food science that the
country is facing. Moreover, this report will focus on pros positive and negative sides of three-solution
relating to this issue and finally will recommend a suitable solution.
Chief problems related to agriculture in Canada:
Agricultural salinity implies the impact of salinity on root-zones of crop plants. Hence, salinity
problems lead damage of plants and crops to a great extend. On the other side, the salinity tolerance at the
root zone of a plant indicates the degree of tolerance up to which crop yield and plant productions remain
unaffected. In Canada, many crops like peas, beans, wheat and flax decrease their productivity levels
when the amount of salt increases by a small amount. This agricultural productivity problem has led
researchers of Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada to fabricate access and design tolerance-testing facility
at a high level that can generally determine salinity tolerance of Canadian agricultural sector. Soil
degradation generally has seen in the Prairies, where large portions of natural grassland were ploughed

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previously without considering soil stability or crop capacity (Awada, Lindwall and Sonntag 2014). Soils
of prairies generally contain water-soluble salts at a high level that include sodium sulphates, magnesium
and calcium. According to the Water Conservation Branch of Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Administration
(PFRA), Canada faced huge loss in their national income due to soil salinity in 1983.
In the Prairie region, almost 12% land of agricultural region was marked as risky due to
salinization, at a moderate, high or very high level. However, those regions have improved their soil
condition over time and in 2011, and have showed a very low level of risk because of salinization (Kerr
2017). By using a suitable map, one can easily indicate changes in salinization in different regions of
Canada, since 1981.
Figure 1: Risk on the Prairies in Canada due to Soil Salinization

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Source: (Kerr 2017)
The above figure indicates that risk level has reduced all over the Prairies between 1981 and 2011
and has showed affectively in Saskatchewan. This map has explained this variation by using different
colours.
Plausible solution to prevent soil salinity:
Soil salinity control refers the process to prevent degradation of due to salinization and recover
salinized land for agricultural purpose (Panagea, Daliakopoulos, Tsanis and Schwilch 2016). Hence, to
control the level of salinity, farmers and other agro-based researchers can apply various methods.
However, it is important to mention that there are various natural and man-made assets, which have
different levels of salinity tolerance. Hence, it is important to give focus o values and risks when someone
is dealing with soil salinity.
Salt leaching:
The amount of total production in agricultural sectors depends upon several factors, for example,
climate condition and the amount of salt content in soil. However, excessive amount of soil salinization in
the root zone can prevent growth rate of plants. Hence, it is important to remove excess salts from soil to
recover it again for further production. To do reclamation, some methods could be applied, which are
scraping, flushing and leaching (Libutti and Monteleone 2017). However, scraping and flushing cannot
eradicate salts from soil properly. One the other side, leaching is the most effective method to remove
salts from soils. Leaching refers the process where fresh water is stored on the surface of soil to infiltrate.
Leaching can be effective by discharging salty waters from the subsurface through drainage system. By
this method, leaching can reduce salinity levels through natural drainage system without enhancing the
water table (Assouline, Russo, Silber and Or 2015). The process is generally applied when the moisture
content in soil is low and when the groundwater table is deep. However, during summer, this process

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becomes less affective due to evaporation. Hence, this process can be said as different type of irrigation
with drainage facility.
Pros and cons:
Leaching does not only control soil salinization, rather it also has some other impacts. In this
process, water runs towards down through the surface of soil that further carries away other materials
from soil that help plants to grow further. A minor level of leaching generally occurs due to rain fall that
helps to enrich soil with minerals (Bortolini, Maucieri and Borin 2018). However, excessive rain falls or
irrigation system negatively affects soils. As a result, ph level can be increased in the soil, which further
makes it over acidic. Excessive amount of acid or higher level of pH is not good for plants ( Zhao et al.
2017). Moreover, leaching takes away excessive nutrients from topsoil and some nutrients remain in the
lower level and go towards the groundwater. This further destroys human health due to excessive nitrate
content in ground water. This process further causes soil erosion in an indirect way.
Salt tolerant crops:
Salt tolerant crops mean those plants, which can tolerate salinity with high level and thir
production level does not change due to salinization. Hence, salt tolerance can be stated as the relative
growth rate o plants when salinity is presence. Hence, this method is important when irrigated lands have
salinity problem and high level of salinization occurs. By applying the elective conductivity of the extract
(ECe) in deciSiemens per metre (dS/m), soil can be classified (Matthees et al. 2017). Cotton, sugerbeet
and barley are some examples of crops that can be grown in a soil with relatively high salinity. On the
other side, corns and beans are grown up in soils with very low level of salt. Sometimes, controlling
salinity through leaching and drainage and recovering of soil have become very costly for farmers.

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Figure 2: Salinity tolerance of different crops
Source: (Prairiesoilsandcrops.ca 2018)
The above figure is representing the salinity tolerance index of different crops. According to the
Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC) , higher value is indicating that the crop has greater tolerance.
Pros and cons:
In this context, it becomes easier for them to cultivate those plants, which have high level of salt
tolerance. Moreover, it becomes economically feasible to produce those crops where good quality of
water is not available (Arzani and Ashraf 2016). There are varieties of species within some crops that can
tolerate high level of salt. Hence, the genetic potential to develop crops can be obtained. However, this
process has some negative impacts or disadvantages. Firstly, production under salinization some time
negatively affects human beings and animals. For example, fruits with high salt content are not healthy
always. Moreover, this also reduces quality of foods by reducing storage life. Furthermore, salt-tolerant
crops need some consideration to breed. Those are related to technical aspects, interactions between
management of water and soil with salt tolerance and impacts of salt on the quality of food.

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Management of soil salinity:
As stated before, soil salinity can be occurred due to various natural causes and human activity.
Canada is also facing salinization due to those factors. Natural causes include floods and heavy rain and
human activity include irrigation (González-Alcaraz, Jiménez-Cárceles, Álvarez and Álvarez-Rogel
2014). To control soil salinity, a country needs to implement good management system to support their
framers so that they can produce agricultural products to a large extent. Hence, except leaching and
drainage system and production of salt tolerance crops, the farmer and researcher needs to monitor on the
salinity level that can be increased due to irrigation system (Deinlein et al. 2014). For this, it is essential
to measure the amount of salt content in the irrigated water. Moreover, excess of crops can be used as
mulch that makes a layer on the surface of soil and prevent build up of salts by maintaining soil moisture.
Farmers can also apply gypsum to reduce the level of sodium in soil.
Pros and cons:
Management of soil salinity can control salinization by various methods. For small lands, those
methods are affective. But in case of large size lands, those methods are not applicable ( Morillo et al.
2014). Hence, to control soil salinity in a large scale, farmers and agricultural researchers need to apply
other technology with new and innovative methods as those management systems are old.
Recommendation:
After analysing three methods to prevent soil salinity with their respective pros and cons, a
recommendation can be drawn. From the above discussion, it can be said that the production of salt
tolerant crops are more affective. In Canada, researchers are receiving various successful outcomes in this
context. Moreover, it will feasible for farmers to produce more crops without changing the pattern of soil.
This can further reduce the production cost of those farmers. However, to produce more slat tolerant
foods, the researchers need to research more. In this context, it is valuable to mention that the Agriculture
and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC) has been giving various practical outcomes to the Prairie farmers of

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Canada, since 1988. They have analysed the level of salt tolerance among wide range of agricultural
products and this further has helped them to recommend selected salt-tolerant breeding to farmers for
better production.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, it can be said that the vast area of agricultural land in Canada has faced decreasing
level of production due to soil salinity. However, the country can overcome this situation by adopting
suitable technique through research and development. Soil leaching and drainage, production of salt
tolerant crops and other managerial activities regarding control of soil salinity can help agricultural lands
to produce more outputs by decreasing the amount of salt. Each method has some advantages and
disadvantages. After analysing these all, it can be state that the production of salt tolerant crops is more
feasible for farmers. This method can further increase the total amount of output without decreasing the
amount of salt in soil.

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References:
Arzani, A. and Ashraf, M., 2016. Smart engineering of genetic resources for enhanced salinity tolerance
in crop plants. Critical Reviews in Plant Sciences, 35(3), pp.146-189.
Assouline, S., Russo, D., Silber, A. and Or, D., 2015. Balancing water scarcity and quality for sustainable
irrigated agriculture. Water Resources Research, 51(5), pp.3419-3436.
Awada, L., Lindwall, C.W. and Sonntag, B., 2014. The development and adoption of conservation tillage
systems on the Canadian Prairies. International Soil and Water Conservation Research, 2(1), pp.47-65.
Bortolini, L., Maucieri, C. and Borin, M., 2018. A Tool for the Evaluation of Irrigation Water Quality in
the Arid and Semi-Arid Regions. Agronomy, 8(2), p.23.
Deinlein, U., Stephan, A.B., Horie, T., Luo, W., Xu, G. and Schroeder, J.I., 2014. Plant salt-tolerance
mechanisms. Trends in plant science, 19(6), pp.371-379.
González-Alcaraz, M.N., Jiménez-Cárceles, F.J., Álvarez, Y. and Álvarez-Rogel, J., 2014. Gradients of
soil salinity and moisture, and plant distribution, in a Mediterranean semiarid saline watershed: a model
of soil–plant relationships for contributing to the management. Catena, 115, pp.150-158.
Kerr, J.G., 2017. Multiple land use activities drive riverine salinization in a large, semi‐arid river basin in
western Canada. Limnology and Oceanography, 62(4), pp.1331-1345.
Libutti, A. and Monteleone, M., 2017. Soil vs. groundwater: The quality dilemma. Managing nitrogen
leaching and salinity control under irrigated agriculture in Mediterranean conditions. Agricultural water
management, 186, pp.40-50.
Matthees, H.L., He, Y., Owen, R.K., Hopkins, D., Deutsch, B., Lee, J., Clay, D.E., Reese, C., Malo, D.D.
and DeSutter, T.M., 2017. Predicting Soil Electrical Conductivity of the Saturation Extract from a 1: 1
Soil to Water Ratio. Communications in Soil Science and Plant Analysis, 48(18), pp.2148-2154.

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Morillo, J., Usero, J., Rosado, D., El Bakouri, H., Riaza, A. and Bernaola, F.J., 2014. Comparative study
of brine management technologies for desalination plants. Desalination, 336, pp.32-49.
Panagea, I.S., Daliakopoulos, I.N., Tsanis, I.K. and Schwilch, G., 2016. Evaluation of promising
technologies for soil salinity amelioration in Timpaki (Crete): a participatory approach. Solid Earth, 7(1),
p.177.
Prairiesoilsandcrops.ca. (2018). Prairie Soils and Crops. [online] Available at:
http://www.prairiesoilsandcrops.ca/ [Accessed 4 Mar. 2018].
Ramírez, D.A., Kreuze, J., Amoros, W., Valdivia-Silva, J.E., Ranck, J., Garcia, S., Salas, E. and Yactayo,
W., 2017. Extreme salinity as a challenge to grow potatoes under Mars-like soil conditions: targeting
promising genotypes. International Journal of Astrobiology, pp.1-7.
Zhao, X., Deng, H., Wang, W., Han, F., Li, C., Zhang, H. and Dai, Z., 2017. Impact of naturally leaking
carbon dioxide on soil properties and ecosystems in the Qinghai-Tibet plateau. Scientific Reports, 7(1),
p.3001.