Potentialities and uses of halophytic species and ecosystems

Abstract

Poljakoff-Mayber and Gale (1975) opined that the applied aspect of basic research on salinity at times seems a little academic since many of the agrotechnical solutions devised to cope with salinity were and are based on trial and error. Nevertheless, an intelligent approach to problem solving and a thorough understanding of the effect of man on the environment requires this basic information. An enormous area of the world is too saline to produce economic crop yields, and newer areas are becoming unproductive by human interference due to salt accumulation. Salinity problems in agriculture are pronounced in arid and semi-arid regions where rainfall is too low to leach salt from the plant root zone. Drainage water that has passed through the soil has a higher salt concentration than the irrigation water (Wilcox and Resch, 1963; Carter et al., 1971). When such a drainage water returns to the natural stream or channel, problems of salinity are created for agriculture.