Soil Salinization

Soil salinization is the build-up of soluble salts in agricultural soil to a level that damages plant growth, most often caused by irrigation water evaporating and leaving its dissolved mineral content behind in the root zone, especially under poor drainage or over-irrigation in arid and semi-arid farmland. It is one of the oldest documented agricultural failures, associated with the decline of irrigated Mesopotamian agriculture, and remains a major cause of cropland abandonment in irrigated regions today.