Soil suitability investigation for land use options in Mbazi sector

Abstract

This research was carried out in the Mbazi Sector, Huye District, and Southern Province. The objectives of the study is to investigate the soil suitability for land use planning for agriculture. The investigation of the soil suitability was based on the soil properties information sourced from the Rwanda soil database and verified in the Research and Postgraduate Laboratory of Soil and Plants. The soil suitability investigation has a good impact on the crop production due to the selection of seed plantation according to soil suitability. The soil in the study site has three different topographical features including,low land, middle land and up land. 24 soil samples were considered to verify some soil parameters including: organic carbon, bulk density, moisture content andexchangeable acidity, cation exchangeable capacity, soil texture, total nitrogen, electrical conductivity, available phosphorus soil pHinwater and KCl media. The soil in all topographical features is well drained with sandy loam as the dominant soil texture class.The value of bulk density values are: 1.38 g/cm3, 1.44 g/cm3 and1.66 g/cm3 respectively from low land, middle land and upland. The soil reaction was strongly acid with pH ranging from 4.80 to 5.0. Low values of total nitrogen (TN)and organic carbon (OC) were recorded as well as very low values of available phosphorus in upland but for low and middle was medium this depend on an amendment. The soil moisture content for lowland (16.97%), middle land(9.24%) and upland (6.64%) were generally low. The electrical conductivityvalues were 0.029ds/m at 0-30 cm depth and 0.037ds/m) at 30-60 cm depth for low land. For middle land, values were of 0.015ds/m at 0- 30 cm depth and 0.021ds/m)at 30-60 cm depth. For upland, the mean values were 0.038ds/m at 0-30 cm depth and 0.027ds/mat 30-60 cm depth. The soil texture was sand loam in low land and in B horizons of middleand upland. The texture of the top horizon for middle landand upland was loam sand. The exchangeable acidity and exchangeable aluminium are very high while the exchangeable bases are very low due to high acidity as demonstrated by low pH values.The computation of data has concluded that presently, the land was marginally suitable for proposed crops. However if land management and cropping systems were to be applied, some parameters including: moisture content, soil organic carbon, soil acidity, N-P-K, and base saturation can be improved and bust the land suitability