Conservation Agriculture in West Asia

Abstract

The soils of the agricultural areas in West Asia are suffering from degradation, erosion and reduction in fertility that is reflected on the quantity and quality of production. The results of field research in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Jordan, Turkey and Iran for the past 10 years or more, comparing Conservation Agriculture (CA) methods to conventional tillage methods, show that CA, the newly introduced method of soil management, is environmentally and economically more beneficial than the conventional method of tilling and farming. In this chapter, the results of field research and extension programmes in countries of the West Asia region are presented. The CA research has been conducted on rainfed and irrigated agriculture, on various soil types, and farmed by people of varying educational backgrounds. Farmers in the West Asia region are being encouraged to shift from the current degrading conventional methods of farming to CA systems. The results have generally verified that the no-till method of farming is more beneficial to the farmers and to the environment, if there is effective weed management. The results also verified that CA is a good approach to rebuild soil and agricultural productivity.