Impact of agricultural land use on soil quality: a case study in Nan Province, Thailand

Changing land use practices are a current theme of scientific research. The recent report studying in Global forest resources assessment shows that the environment has been greatly changed from the past. Currently, Southeast Asian countries are facing geo-ecological problems from the environmental change. One of the most important problems in SEA is deforestation. However, the problem still exists in some regions of Thailand. The problem was found arisen rapidly in northern region where most area is containing of mountains, forested hills, dense jungle, and river valleys with fertile natural resources. The improper land use management can lead to plenty of problems such as deforestation, loss of wildlife habitat and environmental pollution. The soil degradation is also one of main problems. In this study focuses on soil quality changing by agricultural activities which proceeded to the mountainous area. The methods were used for this study are soil properties investigation; soil chemical properties and soil physical properties, another method is questionnaires to survey data of farming activities. All data analyzed and study of related effect. The examined result showed soil properties still suitable for planting when compared the result with the optimum standard except the abandoned field. The second part is survey study about agricultural activities in sample areas. The investigation found three improper farming activities which impact on soil quality; adding chemical fertilizer, adding chemical enhancer and planting in drought condition. However, the further study suggest a recommendation to manage problems are control fertilizer addition follows crop requirement, applying alternative crops, adopting terrace method, creating more water storage, replacing burning crop residue activity by tillage or burying.