Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
livelihoods is outlined. The development and adoption of Biosaline Agriculture
practices as a way to restore productivity of salt affected desert lands is explained.
Key Points
•
Rangeland vegetation of the arid and semi arid zones of Uzbekistan served as a
crucial natural resource for livelihood development of the pastoral communities
for many centuries and at the same time acts now as an “ecological tool”
of protection against desertification. It is thus of great importance to preserve
natural rangelands and to maintain their long term stability through application
of consistent grazing management or using of improvement methods through
cultivation of native drought and salt tolerant species.
•
Facing the challenges of food security, Central Asian countries are keen to
improve utilization of rangelands. Unfortunately, most governments in the
region have limited financial resources, inconsistent legal instruments, and weak
capacity to regulate and monitor sustainable use of rangelands. Thus, a more
holistic approach to the ecosystem processes is needed in order to reduce the
feed gap and mitigate rangeland degradation and desertification.
•
Spatial and temporal changes of natural rangelands vegetation in the arid
area affected by salinity need to be understood in order to initiate different
revegetation strategies. Halophytes are an underutilized plant resource. They
grow well in association with a variety of arid/semi-arid rangeland species
and often provide severe competition to perennial species, both in natural and
improved pastures.
•
Where rangeland degradation has occurred there is need for rehabilitation
measures to be applied. Incorporating fodder halophytes into the agro-silvi
pastoral system or domestication of wild halophytes species represents low cost
strategies for rehabilitation of desert degraded rangelands and abandoned farmer
lands affected both by soil and water salinity.
•
Introduction and adaptation of native drought tolerant fodder desert species and
halophytes have the potential to provide a way to improve the livelihood of
farmer's income at abandoned degraded marginal areas.
•
A mixture of desert fodder species planted within the inter-spaces of salt-tolerant
trees/shrubs plantations improves productivity of degraded rangelands affected
by soil salinization. Application of such an approach solves the animal feed gaps
in the lands degraded both by overgrazing and salinity, and leads to increased
income for farmers. Agro-silvi-pastoral approaches for landscape planning and
rehabilitation of saline soils represent a model of ecosystem function/services
for agro-pastoral communities as adaptation measures to mitigate climate change
impact
s
•
Dryland salinity and associated water quality are recognized to be among the
most severe natural resource degradation problems in the marginal desert belt
of Aral Sea Basin. Access to irrigation water in this region has drastically
decreased in the last years, which caused additional obstacles to rangelands
productivity and agricultural production. Replacement of deep-rooted, perennial
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