Effects of agricultural practices on properties and metal content in urban garden soils in a tropical metropolitan area
2014
Prudent, Pascale | Massiani, Catherine | Höhener, Patrick | Renault, Pierre
The appearance of agriculture in urban areas improved the healthiness of the diet of people by enabling their consumption of fresh vegetables and fruits. This study assessed the level of fertility, and the impact of the cropping system and of the exploitation time on the physicochemical properties and the pseudo-total and EDTA-extractable metals contents of the vegetable soils of urban garden of in Libreville (Gabon). The results indicated a low fertility of the cultivated soils. The metal contents in the open field cultured soils were generally different from the soils cultured under shelters. Except Al that could be toxic for cultivated vegetables, the soil properties and metal element concentrations decreased significantly with time in the open field soil, while they did not vary in open shade cultured soils. The pseudo-total cadmium concentration was below the detection limit in all soils. Multivariate analysis showed that Al, Fe and Pb were of lithogenic origin, while Cu, Zn and Mn were of anthropogenic origin.
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