Effect of Organic Cultivation on Soil Properties under Different Cropping Systems: A Review

Modern farming requires sustainable use of soil resources because soil quality can easily be deteriorated within a short period of time. For sustainable agricultural productivity, it is utmost important to improve and maintain soil physical, chemical and biological health. The micro biodiversity plays a crucial role in ensuring the availability of inherent and applied nutrients in the soil to the crop plants. The characterization of physical, chemical and microbiological properties of soil in relation to organic cultivation is important for recommending the nutrient and water input for optimum plant growth. The sustainability of World’s agriculture is threatened by sharp declining factor productivity due to deteriorating soil quality, imbalanced use of fertilizers, mismatch between nutrient additions and removal and escalating cost of production. Despite the reduced potential of agro-ecosystems, organic cultivation can contribute to build up, or at least maintain, soil nutrient reserves whilst at the same time maximizing nutrient recycling and reducing external inputs. Organic farming is a system of crop production, which primarily aims to keep soil alive and in good health using organic based nutrient inputs like compost, farm yard manure, green manure, vermicompost, bone meal and crop residues etc.