Land use and management in the urban farm "Las Mercedes". Case of study

This work was carried out in the urban farm "Las Mercedes" in the municipality of Matanzas, Cuba, with the objective of evaluating the current use and management of soil resources to avoid its degradation and increase sustainable food production. The main agro-productive limitations of edaphic character were determined, and the fields were georeferenced. A field diagnosis was carried out to evaluate the effective depth, maximum slope, stoniness and presence of carbonates in order to establish the agrological class of the crop fields. The inadequacies in the use of the soils according to their suitability were established and the conservationist use and management of the fields was recommended in order to control soil degradation and achieve sustainable agricultural development. It was proposed to improve the current use and management of seven fields with agrological class IV, to work and arrange the furrows in contour in three fields with a 5-7 % slope, to change the use of two fields with agrological class VI and to subdivide two fields with different agrological classes. In addition, it was proposed to develop a rehabilitation project to improve the current use of a field with susceptibility to flooding and surface and internal drainage problems, whose diagnosis was limited in magnitude and quality in the present study.