SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, 16 Apr. (EUROPE PRESS) –
The Cabildo de Tenerife, through the area of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries, finances a new series of agri-environmental monographs, of an informative nature, with which it is intended to bring scientific and academic knowledge closer to the whole of society.
The first volume, entitled ‘Volcanic Soils of the Canary Islands’, was recently presented by the second vice-president and Minister for the Presidency, Finance and Modernisation, Berta Pérez, and the Minister for Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries, Javier Parrilla, at an event at the in which the author José Manuel Hernández Moreno, Professor of Edaphology and Agricultural Chemistry at the University of La Laguna, also participated.
According to Berta Pérez, the idea is that the research and experiences collected in this work also serve “as a reference document for agricultural and environmental experts, thus contributing to improving the sector”.
For more than 40 years, José Manuel Hernández has dedicated his professional life to teaching and research and has established himself as a regional, national and international benchmark in volcanic soils. “This work is the fruit of his scientific knowledge and constitutes a very useful work tool for professional agronomists, foresters and environmentalists. It is a book whose applications will be very practical and will allow many farms to improve their soil management,” he added. Bertha Perez.
For his part, Javier Parrilla highlighted the possibilities, in terms of research, that emerge from the area, as well as the need to exploit them. “I am convinced that the volume that we present today will serve as the basis for the new reality of agricultural water in Tenerife and will become a day-to-day work tool for our area,” he said.
The soils of the Canary Islands are characterized by their enormous diversity in terms of their typology and geographical distribution, mainly due to the great variability of the factors that determine the formation of the soils: the climate, the vegetation, the source material, the relief and the time of evolution.
As stated in the book in its introduction, soils with Andean characteristics (soils of volcanic origin) are, both in terms of extension and due to their forestry and agronomic interest, the most important in a large part of the Canary archipelago.
The relationships between the characteristic components of Andean soils and their properties are well documented in the Canary Islands. However, there are hardly any agronomic and environmental studies that identify the types of soils, as well as the associated specific physical and chemical processes, which prevents the proper interpretation of their results. In addition, basic studies are generally found in scientific-technical publications, which makes their dissemination difficult.
The objective of this book, therefore, explained José Manuel Hernández, “is to help fill this gap with the compilation of studies in the field or through laboratory simulations of the effects of managing Andean soils and the agronomic and environmental repercussions “. In the same way, it is intended to evaluate the methodology used for the characterization of Andean soils.
