Salt removing crops in arid climates

摘要

The climate changes and global warming have become the most complicated issue facing world leaders. Moreover, warnings from the scientific community are becoming louder, as an increasing body of science points to rising dangers from the ongoing buildup of human-related greenhouse gases -produced mainly by the burning of fossil fuels and forests. What is climate changes, how do we know they are happening, and what can we expect from them? Certainly, the answer to these questions we must be known and understood. Another problem related to these climate changes and global warming is the increase of soil salinity. Beside this increase, current problems arising the agricultural development are appearing, as natural disasters, drinking water scarcity, less food production, infectious diseases and lower soil productivity. Conventional techniques used to control soil salination process - soil leaching or fertilization enhancing - contribute highly to soil and aquifers contamination; on the other hand, the use of salt tolerant plant species will be very useful to the plants, but it does not solve the problem of soil or groundwater contamination. Hence, the only way to control the salination process and to maintain the sustainability of landscape and agricultural fields is to combat the salination problems by environmentally safe and clean techniques. One of these techniques is the use of salt removing species. In order to study the potential capacity to remove soil salts, two horticultural leaf species Portulaca oleracea and Tetragonia tetragonioides were planted in order to be studied their potential as salt removing species. Plants were analysed relatively to their total growth and mineral composition of the leaves. According to the results of plant growth and leaf analysis, it was seen that Tetragonia tetragonioides are the best salt removing species. It was shown that this technique to control salinity is a powerful and environmental clean tool to maintain the sustainability of the landscape and of the agricultural areas. As final remarks, it is concluded that in arid climates and global warming, the clean and environmental safe procedures to control salinity could be associated to the conventional techniques, combining environmental, economical and social aspects, contributing, therefore, to increase the sustainability of irrigated areas and plant growth.