Abstract
Assessing soil quality is considered one the most important indicators to ensure planned and sustainable use of agricultural lands according to their potential. The current study was carried out to develop a spatial model for the assessment of soil quality, based on four main quality indices, Fertility Index (FI), Physical Index (PI), Chemical Index (CI), and Geomorphologic Index (GI), as well as the Geographic Information System (GIS) and remote sensing data (RS). In addition to the GI, the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) parameter were added to assess soil quality in the study area (western part of Matrouh Governorate, Egypt) as accurately as possible. The study area suffers from a lack of awareness of agriculture practices, and it depends on seasonal rain for cultivation. Thus, it is very important to assess soil quality to deliver valuable data to decision makers and regional governments to find the best ways to improve soil quality and overcome the food security problem. We integrated a Digital Elevation Model (DEM) with Sentinel-2 satellite images to extract landform units of the study area. Forty-eight soil profiles were created to represent identified geomorphic units of the investigated area. We used the model builder function and a geostatistical approach based on ordinary kriging interpolation to map the soil quality index of the study area and categorize it into different classes. The soil quality (SQ) of the study area, classified into four classes (i.e., high quality (SQ2), moderate quality (SQ3), low quality (SQ4), and very low quality (SQ5)), occupied 0.90%, 21.87%, 22.22%, and 49.23% of the total study area, respectively. In addition, 5.74% of the study area was classified as uncultivated area as a reference. The developed soil quality model (DSQM) shows substantial agreement (0.67) with the weighted additive model, according to kappa coefficient statics, and significantly correlated with land capability R2 (0.71). Hence, the model provides a full overview of SQ in the study area and can easily be implemented in similar environments to identify soil quality challenges and fight the negative factors that influence SQ, in addition to achieving environmental sustainability.
Highlights
There are more than 800 million people who are chronically undernourished [1]
In the winter and spring seasons, the vegetation cover changing due to rainfall is active and the natural vegetation spreads within study area, in the wadis and streams in addition, the natural vegetation growth during the autumn and summer seasons because of the natural vegetation spreads on the fine sand stacks that keep rainwater [31] and barley is the main crop in the study area in addition small areas of some scattered olive trees (Figures 1 and 2)
Soil quality assessment is very important for sustainable agricultural practices management and for precision farming especially
Summary
There are more than 800 million people who are chronically undernourished [1]. Africa has the highest proportion of people who suffer from chronic hunger [1]. Political instability in most African countries affects agricultural practices and leads to underdeveloped and underexploited lands, having direct consequences for society [3]. In Egypt, agricultural lands are located in the Nile valley and the delta, which represent about 4% of the total area of Egypt [4]. The agricultural sector in Egypt plays a vital role in economic growth as it contributes 14.5%, 30%, and 41% of national gross domestic product, provision of foreign currency, and reducing unemployment, respectively [5]
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