On the World Soil Day, when a campaign, ‘Halt soil salinisation, boost soil productivity’ has already been launched worldwide to raise awareness about the importance of maintaining healthy soil and human well-being, a block-wise analysis of Punjab’s soil can perhaps help arrest further degradation of soil in the interest of farmers particularly and society in general. The only challenge here is how to keep every farmer updated with such things.
As per this analysis, around 40% of the soil in Punjab already has high levels of phosphorus and it can help farmers reduce consumption of Di-Ammonium Phosphate (DAP) fertiliser thereby reducing the cost of inputs while maintaining good soil health.
Soil analysis was conducted by a soil expert and retired Deputy Director of Agriculture Soil Testing Karnal (Haryana), Madan Lal Khurana, and he had also submitted his analysis to the Punjab Agriculture Department.
This analysis was conducted blockwise in the past couple of years. The soil of 127 blocks of 22 districts was mapped (as Malerkotla was the part of Sangrur district then). According to this analysis in 51 blocks over half the area has high phosphorus presence in the Hajipur block’s 88% soil which witnesses high phosphorus. And 47 blocks have medium presence of the phosphorus. with Dhuri block with 87.36% of its soil having the highest area where medium phosphorus is available and in 29 blocks the phosphorus presence is low with Nihal Singh Wala block in Moga district having high deficiency of it where 50.23% of its land observing low phosphorus.
Apart from this, the other blocks with high phosphorus presences included Barnala block in district Barnala where 86% of its soil is categorised under high phosphorus. Sehna block in Barnala is having 80% soil with high phosphorus), Tarsika and Verka blocks in Amritsar have 76%, and 70% soil with high phosphorus, respectively, Mamdot of Ferozepure district has 70% soil with high phosphorus, Bhunga Hajipur-one, and Tanda blocks in Hoshiarpur district have 74%, 77%, and 70% soil with high phosphorus, respectively.
Phagwara in Kapurthala, Sirhind in Fatehgarh Sahib, Khadoor Sahib and Patti in Tarntaran observed 71%, 70.7%, 80.95 %, 77.96% soil with high phosphorus, respectively.
Makhu block Ferozepur, Morinda block and Chamkaur Sahib in Ropar Patran block in Patiala, Bamial in Pathankot, Mukatsar block in Mukatsar Sahib, Rajpura in Patiala and Tarn Taran block in Tarn Taran district have shown 78%, 84.02%, 76.02%, 72.2%, 73.19%, 73.62%, 81.94%, 72.01%, soil, respectively falls under medium presence of phosphorus.
In most of the block, only 1 to 10 % soil comes under low phosphorus barring some where presence of phosphorus is quite low. The Guru Harsahai block in Ferozepur Naushera in Tarn Taran Mehal Kalan in Barnala district has 35%, 26.23% and 23% land, respectively, with low phosphorus. According to experts, the soil which shows high presence of Phosphorus means the usage of Di-Ammonium Phosphate (DAP) should be very limited or its other easily available alternatives can be used in limited quantities as per the directions of agricultural experts of the area.
The soil with less than 5 kg phosphorus per acre comes under low category, 5 to 10 kg per acre in medium and 10 to 20 kg per acre in high and above this comes under excessive category.
Dr Amrik Singh, Agriculture Officer Pathankot, said that the recommended dose of DAP for medium category soil is 55 KG per acre and if soil comes under low category, then we recommend to put 65 KG DAP per acre and in high category we recommend 40 to 45 KG and in excesshere is no use of putting DAP.
He said that even usage of nitrogen is also recoemdned in the similar manner wherein low category the usage is 25% more than the recommended and in high it is 25% less than the recommended. For medium soil the recommended urea dose is 90 kg.
📣 The Indian Express is now on Telegram. Click here to join our channel (@indianexpress) and stay updated with the latest headlines
For all the latest Jalandhar News, download Indian Express App.
Anju Agnihotri Chaba … read more
