CORDIS provides links to public deliverables and publications of HORIZON projects.
Links to deliverables and publications from FP7 projects, as well as links to some specific result types such as dataset and software, are dynamically retrieved from OpenAIRE .
Exploitable results
Salinization is closely associated with desertification, which is defined as land degradation in arid, semi-arid and dry sub-humid areas resulting from climatic variations and human activities, with the term land including soil, water resources, crops and natural vegetation.
The results of the project: AN INTEGRATED APPROACH FOR SUSTAINABLE MANAGEMENT OF IRRIGATED LANDS SUSCEPTIBLE TO DEGRADATION/DESERTIFICATION showed that:
-Irrigation with saline waters involves a risk of secondary salinization in clay soils irrigated without any drainage system.
-The salinity distribution is related to the presence of clay, with greater values concentrated in the Vertisol area.
-The LEACHM model, if properly calibrated, provides accurate prediction of the water content and of the electrical conductivity.
-Prediction of the hazard of sodification obtained with the LEACHM model is not satisfactory, and needs further investigation and improvement.
-The irrigation system may affect soil structure and bypass flow phenomena, as well as the hazard of salinization at the field scale. Irrigation systems such as micro-sprinkler or sprinkler should be avoided when saline water is used for irrigation.
-Exchange of solutes occurs at the contact surfaces between the macropores/cracks walls and the incoming solution in concomitance with bypass fluxes.
-Alternating low salinity/sodicity water with a high salinity/sodicity solution can be effective for preventing salinization and sodification.
-Cracking and bypass flow decrease the hazard of salinization in clay soil, promoting leaching of solutes. The presence of cracks may increase the efficiency of salt-leaching when a solution having a low salinity is alternated to a solution with a higher salinity.
-When cracks are present, lower leaching fractions could be necessary to remove salts from the soil profile. In addition, the low hydraulic conductivity in the bottom layers of a soil profile is likely to be counterbalanced by the presence of cracks.
-Crop transpiration and yield in presence of cracks are the result of a combined effect of water available and level of salinity, and can be forecast only by models accounting for both the two factors.
Searching for OpenAIRE data...
There was an error trying to search data from OpenAIRE
No results available