Rising land degradation

On Nov 3, the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations released its report, ‘The State of Food and Agriculture 2025’, which warns that human-induced land degradation is driving down crop yields in many countries. The report calls it a “silent crisis”, one that directly threatens the rural livelihoods and food security of nearly 1.7 billion people.

According to the report, the issue is widespread. However, in developed countries, yield losses caused by land degradation are often masked or temporarily offset by an intensive use of inputs, while in low-income countries where farmers have limited access to inputs, the losses are far more severe.

Although the report does not specifically mention Pakistan, our faulty agricultural practices are steadily pushing us in the same direction.

Since its independence, Pakistan’s agricultural output has increased significantly thanks to three factors: expansion of cultivated area, improved crop yields, and higher cropping intensity (a greater number of crops grown in a single agricultural year).

Since water availability remains a major constraint in reclaiming barren regions, the expansion in cultivated land has been slow, even lagging behind the population growth rate

However, since water availability remains a major constraint on reclaiming barren lands, expansion of cultivated land has been slow, lagging behind population growth. At the same time, yield improvements have also remained modest, except for a few crops.

Consequently, over the past two decades, the focus has shifted towards boosting cropping intensity. Short-duration varieties of rice, maize, sesame, fodder, and vegetables, coupled with greater mechanisation, have made it possible to get three crops in a year easily in irrigated areas.

On the other hand, land fragmentation driven by population explosion and inheritance laws — 61 per cent of farms are now under 2.5 acres as per the 7th Agricultural Census 2024 — compels smallholders to increase cropping intensity for their survival.

Similarly, lessees who cultivate the lands of absentee landlords do their utmost to extract the maximum from the land during their tenancy period.

Nevertheless, this trend has drastically shortened, or virtually eliminated, the fallow period between crops, which is considered essential for restoring soil nutrients and boosting microbial activity. Moreover, it has trapped farmers in a rigid cropping pattern.

As a result, crop rotation, which is highly essential for maintaining soil health and fertility, is steadily declining. For instance, in wheat-growing areas, wheat is cultivated year after year. A similar pattern is observed among rice, sugarcane, and potato farmers.

In the pursuit of higher cropping intensity, farmers’ reliance on chemical fertiliser — particularly urea and DAP — has increased sharply over the years. Consequently, soil organic matter has declined drastically, often falling below 0.5pc in many areas of Punjab. The use of traditional soil enrichment material, such as farmyard manure, compost, and green manure, has virtually disappeared, with only a small fraction of farmers using them.

One serious outcome of this imbalance is that soil pH has risen above 8.0 in several parts of Pakistan, making it strongly alkaline and restricting plants’ ability to absorb key nutrients. Moreover, many farmers burn crop residues in situ in a rush to prepare their fields for the next crop. This harmful practice not only kills beneficial soil organisms and undermines soil health but also contributes to air pollution and smog in winter.

Another major factor driving land degradation is the deteriorating quality of irrigation water. Due to indiscriminate and unregulated groundwater abstraction, the water table continues to decline. As a result, the quality of irrigation water tends to deteriorate in most areas, as it contains higher salt levels, leading to salt accumulation and reduced soil fertility.

At the same time, our farmers excessively till the land, disrupting soil structure, accelerating the loss of organic matter, harming beneficial soil organisms, and reducing biodiversity. All this translates into lower soil fertility and productivity. Moreover, it increases the risk of soil erosion by wind which further undermines the land’s long-term productive capacity.

In view of this situation, and recognising that shrinking farm sizes and rising cropping intensity are unavoidable realities of Pakistan’s agriculture, the government must adopt a proactive approach rather than the traditional reactive one to halt land degradation. This demands concerted efforts to promote sustainable tillage, efficient irrigation, and particularly balanced nutrient application.

Raising awareness among farmers must be a top priority. Unfortunately, even well-educated farmers often lack an adequate understanding of soil conservation and sustainable land management, especially regarding the use of organic fertilisers as partial or full substitutes for chemical fertilisers. Farmers need training in low-cost, on-farm techniques for preparing and applying organic fertilisers to enhance soil health and long-term productivity.

Since not every farmer can produce enough to meet their own needs, it is equally important to establish biogas and composting plants at the city and union council levels through public-private partnerships. These facilities could process the 57,000 tonnes of municipal waste collected daily from urban and rural areas under the “Suthra Punjab” programme.

However, lessons from similar initiatives in the past suggest that competitive pricing and economies of scale will be critical to ensuring widespread adoption of compost by farmers and the financial viability of these plants.

Khalid Wattoo is a development professional and a farmer, and Dr Waqar Ahmad is a former associate professor at the University of Agriculture, Faisalabad.

Published in Brackly News, The Business and Finance Weekly, November 17th, 2025