Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
ABSTRACT
Climate change is now an established phenomenon, irrespective of weath-
er or not, it is anthropogenic or nonanthropogenic in nature. The story of
climate change is an incomplete exercise unless the dynamics of soil fertil-
ity is addressed. Soil fertility is the basis of all life, its origin and the place
of its continuous renewal compels us to see dynamic changes taking place
in soil fertility via climate change. In addition to food security, nutritional
security through fruit crops has become a core agenda of extreme scien-
tific debate. Of them, citrus holds a place of prominence to fulfill these
objectives on one hand, and on the other hand, makes it highly impera-
tive to undertake an incisive analysis as how climate change is dictating
the performance of citrus through soil fertility changes. Elevated atmo-
spheric CO 2 concentration and consequent rise in temperature will trigger
the simultaneous increase in soil temperature, with the result, dynamics of
microbial community structure and diversity both will be influenced, and
hence, available pool of nutrients in soil to varying magnitude as per avail-
able limited studies. These changes need to be mitigated through some
soil carbon sequestering techniques like long-term organic manuring, use
of microbial consortium, integrated nutrient management instead of ex-
clusive chemical fertilizers, etc. With more databases accruing through
researches on these issues, complexities involved in unraveling the soil
fertility-climate change nexus will be eased out in the larger benefit of
citriculture in the years to come. Since citrus is globally grown across 153
countries, in the context of uncertainties associated with global climate
change (direction, rate, seasonal and geographical distribution), such ex-
ercise, however, needs appropriate accelerated efforts.
11.1 INTRODUCTION
An estimate states over 900 million people in the world are undernour-
ished. It has been discussed that malnutrition alone is accountable for 3.5
million deaths per annum (Srivastava, 2012). Plant nutrition in response
to soil fertility is a intricate process that has developed over the course
of plant evolution with the discovery of fundamental importance of plant
nutrition; only second to the invention of photosynthesis as an efficient
medium to strengthen plant defense system. Horticulture is pondered as
 
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