Book Review 17

Review

Title: Principles of Sustainable Soil Management in Agroecosystems

Author(s):

Editor(s): Rattan Lal and B.A. Stewart

Publisher:

ISBN 13: 9781466513464

Published: 2013

Pages: 552

Cost: $139.95

Rating (1-5): 3

Submitted By: Chatterjee, Amitava

Date posted: August 02, 2013

Excellent source for knowing soil management principles in detail

Setting and adopting principles of sustainable soil management in agroecosystems are challenges for soil scientists. Dr. Lal is distinguished university professor of soil physics and the director of the Carbon Management and Sequestration Center at The Ohio State University, and authored and coauthored about 1500 papers and wrote 15 books and edited or coedited 48 books. Dr. Stewart is distinguished professor of soil science at the West Texas A&M University, Canyon, Texas and director of the US Department of Agriculture Conservation and production laboratory at Bushland, Texas. Drs. Lal and Stewart gathered authors from all over the world to address different perspectives of soil management principles. Some topics like, cost-benefit analysis of soil degradation and restoration, spiritual aspects of sustainable soil management are new and will open a new paradigm of thinking for soil sustainability. However, the book lacks serious problem in organizing chapters and it would be better separating out chapters in different meaningful sections. Most papers are essay type rather than synthesis of research knowledge or case study like, chapter 7: ‘Human dimension that drive soil degradation’ by Koontz et al. Current issues like, biofuel production and precision farming were not included or ignored. Moreover, some chapters were weak in their discussion like chapter 8: ‘Managing soil organic carbon concentration by cropping systems and fertilizers in the North China Plain’ by Qing et al., presented data without variance, discussion, and citations. It was hard to follow from their title about the chapter’s content and abstracts were not provided for any chapter. In the beginning, Dr. Lal introduced his own philosophy of different principles of soil management but described them too briefly to make a rationale of inclusion of each principle in the list. The chapter on ‘marginality principle’ is a good follow up of the first chapter but it would be a good idea to talk about marginality in the first paragraph rather than talking about soil classification in details. There are many instances of inclusion of unnecessary discussion throughout the book. Like in chapter 13: ‘Tradition knowledge for sustainable management of soils, authors might avoid enlisting regional soil classification terms. The book will be useful reference for researchers in production agriculture with emphasis on soil management and some chapters can be used as reference materials for graduate coursework in advanced soil fertility class.