Soil resource information and linkages to agricultural production

Abstract

The plan for Modernization of Agriculture (PMA) recognizes the high contribution of the environment and natural resources (ENR) to Uganda’s gross domestic production and that sustainable use of the ENR provides the only cost effective and viable option for the rural poor. Soil productivity is a major factor in sustainable use of ENR. However, information on natural resources and soils in particular, have had limited use in agriculture and resource conservation activities. The existing soils information is not available in digital forms that can be manipulated to suit requirements of different stakeholders and this is one of the major causes of limited use of available natural resource information. The paper describes steps that have been taken to revise and update soils information; establish a soils geographic database(SGDB) and its application in explaining the spatial distribution of coffee wilt diseases in some parts of Uganda. Existing soils information has been updated and correlated to 13 World Reference Base (WRB) soil orders with 37% classified as Gleysols, 25% as Luvisols, 23% as Ferralsols, 12% as Plinthosols, among others. The information is stored in a SGDB which has been successfully tested in a case where soils were linked to the spatial distribution of the coffee wilt disease. Coffee wilt was linked mostly to Lixic Ferralsols (38%) and Acric Ferralsols (48%). Preliminary results indicate that some boundaries on the existing soil map are not a true reflection on the ground truth.