Salinity and horticulture: an unlikely combination

In many semi-arid and arid countries, while the demand of fresh water for human and industrial uses is increasing, surface water and groundwater resources in agricultural areas are becoming increasingly saline. Although quantitative information on salt tolerance exists for many field crops, there is little information on vegetable and ornamental crops, showing the need for research. The salt tolerance of vegetable and ornamental species is important because of their high cash value, compared to other field crops.

While addressing the water issues, the focus in many countries has been on the delivery of water services and much less attention paid to the reuse strategies. In many developing countries, because of lack of funds for treatment, wastewater is disposed into open water bodies like rivers and irrigation canals, leading to contamination. In water scarce countries, wastewater can be turned into a huge asset if treated appropriately for its safe re-use in agriculture. Productive use of treated wastewater for agriculture not only reduces the demand for fresh water in agriculture, but also offers an ecologically sound alternative for waste disposal. The use of high value crops such as vegetables fill an important niche in the production systems using wastewater. For many growers, vegetables can be a crucial source of income.

Since its establishment ICBA has been assembling germplasm, mainly of forage species with proven or potential salinity tolerance to provide a source of genetic diversity to mitigate problems of salinity in agricultural production systems.

In line with ICBA’s new strategy to expand its work to other marginal quality waters such as wastewater, the genetic resources project, while continuing the focus on salinity, has also started acquiring germplasm of high value species such as vegetable, medicinal and ornamental plants to study and develop appropriate production and management systems through applied research. Currently work is in progress on vegetables such as asparagus (Asparagus officinalis), tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum), pepper (Capsicum annuum), okra (Abelmoschus esculanetus)and eggplant (Solanum melongena); and ornamentals such as sunflower (Helianthus annuus), safflower (Carthamus tinctorius), amaranthus (Amaranthus spp.) and stock (Matthiola incana) to identify genotypes suitable for production systems using saline and marginal quality waters.

For more information, contact Dr NK Rao: n.rao@biosaline.org.ae