Tackling Salinity in Sustainable Agriculture—What Developing Countries May Learn from Approaches of the Developed World

Abstract

Soil salinity is a common problem of the developing world as well as the developed world. However, the pace to reduce salinity is much slower in the developing world. The application of short-term approaches with an unsustainable supply of funds are the major reasons of low success. In contrast, the developed world has focused on long-term and sustainable techniques, and considerable funds per unit area have been allocated to reduce soil salinity. Here, we review the existing approaches in both worlds. Approaches like engineering and nutrient use were proven to be unsustainable, while limited breeding and biosaline approaches had little success in the developing countries. In contrast, advanced breeding and genetics tools were implemented in the developed countries to improve the salinity tolerance of different crops with more success. Resultantly, developed countries not only reduced the area for soil salinity at a higher rate, but more sustainable and cheaper ways to resolve the issue were implemented at the farmers’ field. Similarly, plant microbial approaches and the application of fertigation through drip irrigation have great potential for both worlds, and farmer participatory approaches are required to obtain fruitful outcomes. In this regard, a challenging issue is the transition of sustainable approaches from developed countries to developing ones, and possible methods for this are discussed.