Agricultural and Biological Research

Soil erosion impacts on crop productivity and its implications on food security in Kechabira district, Southern Ethiopia

Abera Abiyo Dofee1*, Firehiwot Goshu2

Soil erosion is one of the unresolved problems of rural agriculture in many less developed countries like Ethiopia. Soil degradation in the form of soil erosion and decline in soil fertility is the main problem of the research area, which has influenced the environmental quality and productivity of land. The topsoil conducive to crop productivity is gradually detached by soil erosion that directly impacts soil productivity and results in the issue of food security. Hence, this study investigated the soil erosion problem and its impacts on land productivity and food security implications. The household survey, in combination with field-based geospatial techniques, was applied to assess and analyze the research data. It was surveyed that soil erosion is an acknowledged problem of agricultural activities among the farmers of the study area. The soil of the study area was moderately acidic, with a low category of OM and organic carbon content, a low proportion of available phosphorus, and a very low to low range of total nitrogen. Results of morphometric analysis revealed that the topographic nature of the surface, slope gradient of the area, drainage feature of rivers, and land use/land cover conditions of soil surface were naturally facilitating factors of soil erosion. Most household respondents also confirmed that over-cultivation, cultivation of steep slopes, deforestation, over-grazing, unreliable soil management practices, and poor agricultural techniques are the leading anthropogenic factors for soil erosion in the farm field. About 91% of the interviewed households have observed a decline in land productivity in their farm field. The crop productivity per hectare for selected dominantly produced crops was found to be decreased over five consecutive cropping years between 2013-2017. Hence, most of the surveyed households were food insecure due to the loss of agricultural productivity by soil erosion. From the result, it was concluded that the impacts of soil erosion on the productivity of land was known to be paramount, and the same was confirmed with the basic properties of soil analyzed in the soil laboratory. The crop productivity in the study area declined, so most farmers were impacted by food security problems. It was recommended that combating the severity of the soil degradation problem by applying various soil management practices should be critically considered. Finally, the researchers forwarded that more studies on the issue of climate change impacts on agricultural productivity would be considered for further assessment of the environmental problems in the study area.