article · Frontiers in Environmental Science
Soil degradation linked to land use shifts and landscape topography presents a serious threat to farming productivity and sustainability in the Northwestern Ethiopian Highlands. To understand these influences, soil samples were examined across four land-use types, covering cultivated land, grazing land, forest land, and eucalyptus plantations, alongside upper and lower slope gradients in the Tach Karnuary watershed. Laboratory analyses measured crucial soil physical and chemical parameters, including bulk density, porosity, texture, pH, organic matter, nitrogen, phosphorus, and cation exchange capacity. The findings demonstrated that land use significantly impacts the majority of these physical and chemical characteristics. Furthermore, slope gradient strongly alters soil health. Upper slopes suffer from diminished fertility and more severe physical degradation due to accelerated erosion and nutrient depletion compared to lower slopes. Consequently, tailored management practices are required to restore degraded soils effectively.
In farming landscapes prone to erosion, topsoil loss directly undermines food security and rural livelihoods. Showing how different farming practices and hillside positions influence soil nutrients provides the scientific basis for targeted conservation. This enables agricultural planners and community land managers to target restorative treatments where they will deliver the greatest environmental and productivity benefits.
This research provides baseline environmental data to guide sustainable land management strategies and agricultural planning. Relevant users include regional conservation planners, land management organisations, and agricultural extension services seeking evidence-based soil interventions. As an observational watershed assessment, the findings represent early-stage research that could inform policy guidelines or targeted conservation programmes rather than a commercial product.
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Introduction: Soil degradation resulting from land use changes and topographic variations poses a significant threat to agricultural productivity and environmental sustainability in the Northwestern Ethiopian Highlands. Assessing the influence of land use and slope gradient on soil physicochemical properties is crucial for developing sustainable land management strategies. Methods: This study investigated the effects of four land-use types (cultivated land, grazing land, forest land, and eucalyptus plantations) and two slope gradients (upper and lower slopes) on selected soil properties in the Tach Karnuary watershed in Northwestern Ethiopia. Twenty-four composite soil samples were collected from 0 to 20 cm soil depth in triplicate across all land use and slope categories. In addition, undisturbed soil samples were obtained using a core sampler to assess the bulk density. Standard laboratory procedures were employed to analyze the physical properties (bulk density, porosity, and texture) and chemical properties (pH, organic matter, total nitrogen, available phosphorus, cation exchange capacity, and exchangeable cations). Data were statistically analyzed using analysis of variance (ANOVA). Results: The ANOVA results revealed that land-use type significantly (p < 0.05) affected most soil physicochemical properties, including texture, bulk density, porosity, pH, available phosphorus, organic matter, total nitrogen, cation exchange capacity, and exchangeable cations. Likewise, the slope gradient had a highly significant (p < 0.01) effect on the bulk density, porosity, pH, organic matter, available phosphorus, total nitrogen, cation exchange capacity, and exchangeable cations. Discussion: Soils on upper slopes exhibited lower fertility and more degraded physical conditions than those on lower slopes, primarily because of erosion and nutrient loss. variations in soil properties were also observed across the different land-use types. These findings underscore the urgent need for slope and land use-specific management interventions to mitigate soil degradation, enhance soil fertility, and promote sustainable land use in the erosion-prone landscapes of the Northwestern Ethiopian Highlands.
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DOI: 10.3389/fenvs.2025.1518068
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