- Title
- Climate smart soil management: a win-win response to climate change and food security challenges
- Creator
- Mnkeni, Pearson
- Subject
- Food security
- Subject
- Population growth
- Subject
- Soil degration
- Subject
- Climate change
- Subject
- Global warming
- Subject
- Conservation agriculture
- Subject
- Organic materials
- Type
- Inaugural lecture
- Identifier
- vital:11980
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/10353/d1011255
- Identifier
- Food security
- Identifier
- Population growth
- Identifier
- Soil degration
- Identifier
- Climate change
- Identifier
- Global warming
- Identifier
- Conservation agriculture
- Identifier
- Organic materials
- Description
- Sub-Saharan Africa faces a major food security challenge as a result of projected fast increases in population growth and continuing declining per capita food availability. This calls for accelerated increases in productivity to meet expected increases in food demand. However, the soils from which the extra production is to come from are highly degraded, especially in South Africa where a large proportion of the land is ranked as having high degradation potential. This is compounded by the increasing climate change challenge which will render more land unfavourable for production. The climate change is mainly caused by global warming believed to be a result of increasing greenhouse gas emissions. The link between soil carbon, food security, and climate change will be explained in this paper. It will be shown that the high degradation status of South African soils is related to their low organic carbon contents. Efforts to restore their productivity must include strategies to minimize further loss of organic matter and encouraging carbon sequestration. Some interventions investigated with the help of my students and collaborators are presented. They include use of farmer available organic materials that can be applied to soils to improve soil carbon sequestration and fertility status; use of cyanobacteria to improve soil carbon sequestration and soil biogeochemical performance; and the adoption of conservation agriculture.
- Format
- Publisher
- University of Fort Hare
- Publisher
- Faculty of Science & Agriculture
- Language
- English
- Rights
- University of Fort Hare
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UFH Inaugural Lectures Science and Agriculture
| Thumbnail | File | Description | Size | Format | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| View Details | SOURCEPDF | 6 MB | Adobe Acrobat PDF | View Details |