Sustainable Crop Production from Problematic Soils to Ensure Food Security

Dear Colleagues,

Soil is used for a variety of purposes, including cropping, pasturing, gardening, forestry, agroforestry, construction, etc. The aim is always to find the most suitable type of soil to get the best outcome. About 10% of the total soil resources of the world have little or no considerable limitations when it comes to cropping, yet most of the soils have some kind of limitations in terms of growing crops. Some soils can be productive for only a limited number of crops but offer serious limitations for others. Soils that have serious limitations for agricultural and other land uses are traditionally called problem soils. It is predicted that our planet will be populated with 9 billion people in 2050. This will result in serious issues with food, water, and energy supply, particularly in less developed countries. Considering the human demand, pressure on natural resources has already reached its critical limits. Intensive urbanization has already pressurized available soil resources, and issues around problematic soils are increasing, especially in the developing world, due to mismanagement. Therefore, utilizing problematic soils for agriculture production is inevitable in the current global food demands. This issue will mainly focus on innovative research to attain sustainable crop production from problematic soils including saline, sodic, compact, contaminated, and degraded soils. This issue will cover all the innovative practices to manage soils with problems.

Dr. Zhongbing Chen
Dr. Safdar Bashir
Dr. Saqib Bashir
Topic Editors