Assessment of degradation of agricultural soils arising from brick burning in selected soil profiles

The Impact of Brick Kiln Operation to the Degradation of Topsoil Quality of Agricultural Land

“…The study found that the OM content of the agricultural land in Balla union around the brick field area was decreasing day by day due to the burning of topsoil. Similar result was also observed by Khan et al (2007).…”

“…The study found that the range of both the burnt and unburnt soil pH is suitable for crop cultivation. Though the brick kiln operation decreases the pH of surrounding soil (Khan et al, 2007), the study found the comparatively greater burnt soil pH than the unburnt soil in the study area.…”

“…The EC of the burnt soil samples ranged from 32.4 to 70.9 µS cm -1 , while the EC of the unburnt soil samples ranged from 17.2 to 24.8 µS cm -1 (Table 1). Khan et al (2007) carried out a study on the degradation of agricultural soils arising from brick burning in Western part of Bangladesh. They found that the significant increment in the EC value of the burnt soil was due to burning of salts/nutrients in the soils, which supports the results of the present study.…”

“…It represents a delicate nutritional balance that provides food for many of the animals on earth, either directly in the form of plant material or indirectly in the form of products from animals that eat plants (Rai et al, 2009). But topsoil degra-dation and environmental pollution are the most serious problems in the world today as a result of natural or anthropogenic factors, because of their adverse effects on agriculture and the life on earth (Eswaran et al, 1999;Khan et al, 2007). Brick burning is one of the principal agents of topsoil degradation (Rahman and Khan, 2001).…”

“…Moreover, emission of gaseous pollutants and ash signif-icantly affect the human health and vegetation (Gupta and Narayan, 2010). Brick kilns also have adverse effects on biodiversity and biogeo-chemical cycling (Khan et al, 2007).…”