Modeling soil salinity levels on yield of eggplant, cucumber, tomatoes and lettuce in Abu Dhabi

Abstract

Soil salinity is a major problem affecting crop productivity and quality in irrigated vegetable production under protected and non-protected production systems in many countries. Negative impacts of soil salinity is aggravated by excessive use of groundwater, especially those close to the sea, and low-quality water in irrigation to meet the increasing demand of vegetable consumptions. Excessive soil salinity reduces the productivity of many agricultural crops, including most vegetables, which are particularly sensitive during growth and development of the crops. The salinity threshold (ECt) of most vegetable crops is low (ranging from 1 to 2.5 dS m−1 in saturated soil extracts) and vegetable salt tolerance decreases when saline water is used for irrigation. Although the dummy simulations were performed with a single soil dataset, they showed some variability in yield of different crops under various salinity levels and this trend may increase with the real simulations after involving the received soil dataset for each location.