Characterization, Appraisal of Soil Salinity, Fertility and Amelioration of Non-Saline/Sodic and Saline/Sodic Soils at District Chiniot, Punjab: Pathways for Agricultural Sustainability and Farmers Community Well-being

Abstract

Evaluation of soil fertility consists of estimating the nutrient supplying power of soil. In this regard, a total of 4758 advisory soil samples were received directly from farmers or collected from the agriculturists’ countryside with geolocation data from all over Chiniot district for soil fertility evaluation. To categorize the soil of district Chiniot as normal, saline, saline-sodic, sodic and their ultimate solution, if any; the recommendations were also provided to the farmers in the light of soil samples analyzed reports. The results showed that 92.8% soil samples were found normal, while 4.89% saline, 1.11% saline-sodic and 1.15% sodic of the entire collected soil tester from tehsil Chiniot. However, 92.03% samples were surrounded by definite normal salts decisive limits, while 3.74% saline, 2.57% brackish-sodic and 1.63% sodic of whole assembled tester from tehsil Bhowana. Moreover, 93.73% samples were found normal, while 4.08% saline, 0.86% saline-sodic and 1.32% sodic of entire gathered trials from tehsil Lalian. Also, 50.3% of soil samples were found poor (i.e., <0.86%) in OM, while 40.5% samples were medium (i.e., 0.87 - 1.29%) ranged OM and 9.1% samples had adequate (i.e., > 1.29%) OM of the total collected soil samples from district Chiniot. However, 56.6% of soil samples were established poor in available P (i.e., < 7.0 mg kg^-1), while 39.6% samples were medium (i.e., 7.1 - 14.0 mg kg^-1) ranged P and 3.8% samples had tolerable (i.e., > 14.0 mg kg^-1) soil P of the total collected samples under study. Moreover, 22.9% of soil samples were found poor (i.e., < 80 mg kg^-1) in available K, while 64.1% samples were intermediate (81-180 mg kg^-1) ranged K and 12.8% samples had adequate (i.e., >180 mg kg^-1) soil K of the total collected samples. In squat, depending upon the soil analysis, farmers were guided for fertilizer recommendations according to climate suitability, crop/orchard/vegetable and water/rainfall conditions as being implemented right through the suitable conditions of the Punjab following guidelines of the Directorate of Soil Fertility, Thokar Niaz Baig Lahore.