Special Issue "Resilience in Soils and Land Use"

A special issue of Agronomy (ISSN 2073-4395). This special issue belongs to the section "Soil and Plant Nutrition".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 1 March 2022.

Special Issue Editor

Dr. Antonio Miguel Martínez-Graña
E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Geology, University of Salamanca, Salamanca, Spain
Interests: strategic and environmental impact assessment; analysis of the host capacity or resilience of the territory; environmental restoration projects;
external geological risks and active processes; risks of flooding; water and wind erosion; ground movements;
geomorphological cartography and geoenvironmental thematic cartography; geostatistics applied to the spatial distribution of environmental elements
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The characteristics of a soil (texture, structure, etc.) and its qualities (vulnerability, fertility, etc.) condition, from the environmental point of view, the geophysical, biotic, landscape and socioeconomic environment of each territory. Currently, studies on land use in territorial planning are of interest, the purpose of which was previously to analyze the aptitude of each type of land for a specific use, based on its ability to assume impacts and the potential that the land may have had. The analysis of erosive risks constitutes a parameter to take into account in said management.

The scientific community, given the enormous social interest in monitoring and controlling the environment, is developing methodologies that allow such control that is more efficient. One of the environmental factors to consider is the soil, which constitutes the support for life and is one of the basic natural elements, which is evident in the European Soil Charter, of the Council of Europe, which says, in its First point: “The soil is one of the most precious goods of Humanity. It allows the life of plants, animals and man on the surface of the Earth”. This European charter also highlights the scarcity and fragility of the edaphic resource, indicating that it must be protected through a greater effort in scientific research and interdisciplinary collaboration to ensure the rational use and conservation of soil.

Due to the consideration of soil as a nonrenewable resource due to its regeneration time scale, the need to delve into the study of the importance of soils in the uses of the territory and the effects of soil degradation and erosive risks is established, due to concerns raised worldwide by desertification problems, stating that desertification precedes desertification. Considering the millions of hectares of arable land area, taking into account that a large part must be subtracted due to fallow situations, we would have 0.39 Ha/inhabitant if we consider a population of 40 million, which indicates that there is already a soil deficit, so the erosive processes, desertification and population growth make the situation worse.

Prof. Dr. Antonio Martinez Graña
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

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Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Agronomy is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

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Keywords

  • soil quality
  • soil and biodiversity
  • soil and geodiversity
  • soil–water ratio
  • erosion risks
  • land use planning
  • edaphic resilience and crops
  • agronomy and habitats
  • agronomy and vegetation
  • environmental economics and edaphic productivity
  • environmental impact in edaphology
  • edaphological heritage
  • soil modeling and mapping

Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

Article
Multitemporal Analysis of Land Use Changes and Their Effect on the Landscape of the Jerte Valley (Spain) by Remote Sensing
Agronomy 2021, 11(8), 1470; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy11081470 - 24 Jul 2021
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Abstract
In recent years, the interest of institutions in land use has increased, creating the need to determine the changes in use through spatial-temporal and statistical analysis. This study analyzes the changes over the last 40 years, based on a cartography of landscape units [...] Read more.
In recent years, the interest of institutions in land use has increased, creating the need to determine the changes in use through spatial-temporal and statistical analysis. This study analyzes the changes over the last 40 years, based on a cartography of landscape units obtained from the study of geo-environmental parameters in the Jerte Valley (Spain) with satellite images, Landsat 5 and 7. Subsequently, through the analysis of spatial patterns and diversity and fragmentation indices, and with the Fragstat software, the landscape was characterized from 1994 to the present. The results show that wooded areas decreased slightly, crops increased in altitude and major environmental disturbances (mainly forest fires) negatively affected the environmental mosaic. Land uses affect the landscape by developing larger tesserae (+5 ha), which are less fragmented (−0.15), but more isolated (0.12). This study demonstrates that landscape metrics can be used to understand changes in spatial pattern, help in decision making to implement appropriate management measures in the conservation of traditional land uses, and allow the maintenance of connecting areas between fragments to avoid the loss of natural corridors to increase landscape quality. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Resilience in Soils and Land Use)
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Article
Remote Sensing Calculation of the Influence of Wildfire on Erosion in High Mountain Areas
Agronomy 2021, 11(8), 1459; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy11081459 - 22 Jul 2021
Viewed by 333
Abstract
Soil erosion is one of the most important environmental problems of the moment, especially in areas affected by wildfires. In this paper, we study pre-fire and post-fire erosion using remote sensing techniques with Sentinel-2 satellite images and LiDAR. The Normalized Burn Ratio is [...] Read more.
Soil erosion is one of the most important environmental problems of the moment, especially in areas affected by wildfires. In this paper, we study pre-fire and post-fire erosion using remote sensing techniques with Sentinel-2 satellite images and LiDAR. The Normalized Burn Ratio is used to determine the areas affected by the fire that occurred on 18 August 2016 in the Natural Reserve of Garganta de los Infiernos (Cáceres). To calculate the erosion, the multi-criteria analysis is carried out from the RUSLE. Once all calculations were performed, there was a considerable increase in sediment production from 16 June 2016 (pre-fire) with an erosion of 31 T/ha·year to 16 June 2017 of 74 T/ha·year for areas of moderate fire severity, and an increase from 11 T/ha·year in 2016 to 70 T/ha·year for areas with a very high severity. From the NDVI, it was possible to verify that this also affected the recovery of post-fire vegetation, decreasing the NDVI index 0.36 in areas of moderate severity and 0.53 in areas of very high severity. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Resilience in Soils and Land Use)
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Article
Improving the Management of a Semi-Arid Agricultural Ecosystem through Digital Mapping of Soil Properties: The Case of Salamanca (Spain)
Agronomy 2021, 11(6), 1189; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy11061189 - 10 Jun 2021
Viewed by 710
Abstract
Soil protection and the increase and intensification of agricultural production require detailed knowledge of soil properties and their variability. On the other hand, the complexity associated with traditional soil mapping processes can lead to the implementation of inappropriate agricultural practices that degrade this [...] Read more.
Soil protection and the increase and intensification of agricultural production require detailed knowledge of soil properties and their variability. On the other hand, the complexity associated with traditional soil mapping processes can lead to the implementation of inappropriate agricultural practices that degrade this resource. Therefore, it is necessary to use mapping techniques to provide more detailed information to farmers and managers. In this study, the geostatistical technique ordinary kriging was used to map the distribution of the most important edaphic properties (texture, nutrients content -N, P, K-, pH, organic carbon, water retention, COLE, carbonate content, and cation exchange capacity) from known sampled points, which allows inferring the value and distribution of the different edaphic parameters studied along the agricultural fields. The results obtained show after validation that the analysis of semivariograms is suitable for evaluating the distribution of the main soil parameters on a large scale, since it faithfully reflects their distribution and makes the ordinary kriging tool a suitable method for optimizing the resources available in soil mapping processes. In addition, the knowledge of these distributions made it possible to establish different recommendations for improving the management of the agricultural ecosystem, which will guarantee a higher agricultural yield as well as a better protection of the analyzed soils. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Resilience in Soils and Land Use)
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