Soil Fertility and Plant Nutrition for Sustainable Cropping Systems

Dear Colleagues,

Sustainable food production faces significant challenges due to climate change, land degradation, and the scarcity of natural resources, thereby presenting a major obstacle for modern agriculture. Enhancing soil fertility and optimizing plant nutrition are crucial steps toward developing more sustainable farming systems that can meet increasing food demands while minimizing negative environmental consequences. While soil fertility deals with the availability and plant uptake of essential nutrients, soil health expands the concept so that it includes physical, chemical, and biological soil parameters and their feedback. Both soil fertility and soil quality (health) are directly related to and dependent on sustainable cropping practices, thus surpassing solely improving crop yields by including a focus on minimizing environmental impacts and accounting for long-term effects.

This Special Issue aims to combine interdisciplinary perspectives on emerging concepts, technologies, and practices at the forefront of enhancing soil health, soil quality, nutrient cycling, and crop nutrition in diverse cropping systems. We encourage submissions of original research articles and comprehensive reviews exploring innovative strategies for soil fertility management and nutrient use efficiency in sustainable crop production. Potential topics include but are not limited to the following:

• Ecologically based nutrient management strategies;
• Feedback between plant nutrition and other aspects of sustainable farming;
• Biological nutrient acquisition and plant–microbe interactions;
• Innovations in organic amendments, biofertilizers, and biofortification;
• Novel fertilizer formulations and enhanced efficiency products;
• Nutrient management modeling and impact;
• Breeding for nutrient use efficiency and adaptations to nutrient limitations;
• Rhizosphere processes governing nutrient dynamics and acquisition;
• Integration of crops with livestock for nutrient cycling;
• Agroecological intensification and redesigning cropping systems;
• Policy, social, and economic dimensions of sustainable nutrient management;
• Life cycle assessments of nutrient flows and soil fertility practices.

We welcome submissions reporting original research findings from field studies, greenhouse experiments, modeling efforts, and synthesis/meta-analysis papers, which review important themes that are relevant to the scope of the Special Issue. Approaches relating to multidisciplinary systems that consider interactions among biological, technological, and socioeconomic factors are especially encouraged.

Manuscript submissions will undergo rigorous peer review. Both empirical research articles and comprehensive review papers will be considered for publication in this Special Issue. Please use the following link for more information: https://www.mdpi.com/journal/sustainability/about.

Dr. Daniel Menezes-Blackburn
Dr. Bingjie Jin
Dr. Dong-Xing Guan
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• agriculture sustainability
• soil fertility
• plant nutrition
• cropping systems
• fertilizers
• nutrient use efficiency
• nutrient management
• crop nutrition