Land Use Change Impacts on Crop Yield and Agricultural Soils

A special issue of Agriculture (ISSN 2077-0472). This special issue belongs to the section "Agricultural Soils".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 May 2025) | Viewed by 1133

Special Issue Editors

School of Geographical Sciences, Southwest University, Chongqing 400715, China
Interests: soil ecology; agriculture soil; sustainable agriculture; soil carbon
School of Geographical Sciences, Southwest University, Chongqing 400715, China
Interests: soil carbon stability; soil quality; fragile ecosystem; land use change; climate change
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Changes in the global demand for food and bioenergy have resulted in significant changes in land uses in agricultural systems. The conversion of land use types with different forms of soil management has altered the crop yield and the inputs of above- and below-ground biomass from crops into soils thus promoting changes in the physical, chemical, and biological properties of agricultural soils. The rational changes in land use types have the potential to improve crop yield and maintain or enhance soil quality in agricultural soils, thereby promoting sustainable agriculture. However, unreasonable land use changes can result in a decline in crop yields and soil quality. Although many scientists have worked on related topics, more efforts are still needed to acquire detailed knowledge of land use change and its impacts on crop yield and agricultural soils.

In this Special Issue, we invite conceptual, empirical, review, or exploratory papers that contribute to our understanding of land use change impacts on crop yield and agricultural soils. Research themes may include (but are not limited to) the following:

(1) Influences of land use changes on crop yield;
(2) Influences of land use changes on soil physical, chemical and biological properties;
(3) Relationships between land use changes with surface runoff and soil erosion in agricultural systems;
(4) Changes in soil carbon content and stability due to changes in land use change;
(5) The environmental consequences and climate change of land use change in agricultural systems;
(6) Dynamics of land use and land cover changes in typical agricultural regions.

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Shiwei Liu
Dr. Pujia Yu
Guest Editors

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Keywords

  • soil carbon
  • soil nutrients
  • soil quality
  • crop quality, agriculture system and environment

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

24 pages, 4922 KiB  
Article
Effects of Tillage Systems and Bacterial Inoculation on Enzyme Activities and Selected Soil Chemical Properties
by Ana Ursu, Irina Gabriela Cara, Geanina Bireescu, Mariana Rusu, Gabriel Dumitru Mihu, Segla Serginho Cakpo, Denis Țopa and Gerard Jităreanu
Agriculture 2025, 15(12), 1285; https://doi.org/10.3390/agriculture15121285 - 14 Jun 2025
Viewed by 645
Abstract
Excessive tillage and chemical fertilization are the primary attributes of conventional farming and the main causes of soil degradation. This research focused on the comparative study of two tillage systems: conventional (CT) and no-tillage (NT), as well as on the effect of chemical [...] Read more.
Excessive tillage and chemical fertilization are the primary attributes of conventional farming and the main causes of soil degradation. This research focused on the comparative study of two tillage systems: conventional (CT) and no-tillage (NT), as well as on the effect of chemical fertilizers and different Bacillus megaterium var. phosphaticum inoculum rates (75, 100 and 125%) on soil properties. This short-term experiment was conducted under field conditions in Northeastern Romania from 2023 to 2024. Soil dehydrogenase, catalase, acid, and alkaline phosphatase activities, pH, organic carbon content (SOC), total nitrogen (TN), total phosphorus, and available phosphorus (TP and AP) were determined. Bacillus treatments generally inhibited soil enzyme activity by 0.35 to 57%, depending on the enzyme type. Under NT, activity increased by up to 59% for dehydrogenase, 43% for acid phosphatase, and 70% for alkaline phosphatase compared to the CT system. An opposite trend was found for catalase, along with a negative correlation with the other enzymes. There were positive differences in TP concentration at 125% Ecofertil + N in both CT (0.0577 ppm) and NT (0.0578 ppm) in 2023 compared to the control (0.0346–0.0374 ppm). In the same year, after the first inoculation, AP increased significantly with bacterial treatments in CT, from 32.34% (T0) to 47.94% (T4), and at crop harvest in NT in 2024, from 34.18% (T0) to 91.06% (T3). The results suggest that enzymatic activities and soil chemical properties were more influenced by soil management than the interaction between inoculated bacteria and chemical fertilizers. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Land Use Change Impacts on Crop Yield and Agricultural Soils)
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