Sustainable Water-Fertilizer Management for Soil Salinization Amendment and Crop Production in Salt-Affected Agroecosystems

Dear Colleagues,

Soil salinization is one of the most frequently cited threats to sustainable soil management and agricultural utilization worldwide. Recently, a significant and sustained increase in soil productivity has become urgently required to feed the expanding human population and to promote carbon neutrality. Along with the ever-increasing scarcity of water resources and frequency of extreme weather events, agricultural systems in saline areas are faced with a challenge: maintaining sustainable soil productivity with less water and fertilizer input. Dealing with this challenge requires promoting soil salinization management and preventing degradation, enhancing leaching efficiency under limited irrigation or rainfed conditions and increasing fertilizer nutrient utilization under saline environments. Water and fertilizer are crucial factors in agriculture, and modern agriculture has shifted the focus from traditional high consumption to precise consumption of water–fertilizer. In this respect, optimal soil water–fertilizer management practices and technologies that help to persistently eliminate counter-productive factors and efficiently promote water–fertilizer utilization with less water and fertilizer input are greatly needed be geared toward modern agriculture.

In this Special Issue, we aim to exchange knowledge on any aspect related to amendment, utilization and management of salt-affected soils, thus providing new insights into and better understandings of current advances in experiences, approaches and technologies for sustainable management of water–fertilizer in saline agroecosystems.

Potential topics include but are not limited to the following:

• Advanced approaches to regulate the water–salt regime.
• Soil water flow and solute transport under water-saving irrigation.
• Improving water use efficiency in salt-affected soils.
• Migration and transport of fertilizer nutrients in salt-affected soils.
• Managing fertilizer for better utilization and less losses.
• Soil salinization amendment and fertility improvement.
• Carbon sequestration and nutrient improvement in salinized farmland.
• Monitoring and simulation of coupled processes of soil water, salt and fertilizer.
• Modeling approaches for sustainable soil salinization management.
• Integrated management of water–fertilizer in salt-affected agroecosystems.

Prof. Dr. Rongjiang Yao
Dr. Xiaobing Chen
Guest Editors

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