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Despite
the recent great strides in technology & mechanisation,agriculture has remained the
world's most important primary industry, in which the soil plays pivotal role. About 66
per cent of the global population, comprising of farmers derives its living directly from
the soil. There are no natural resources more important than soil resource. Whatever its production capacities, whether high in some places of irrigated pockets or low in major areas of dryland and desert, due to inherent limitation, the soil resource of Rajasthan, as a medium of growing crops, has furnished directly or indirectly, a significant share in the income of the state. Rajasthan, being geographically the largest state in India, has proportionately a greater soil resource. Therefore, the soil resource in the state needs to be used extensively and efficiently so that the state finds an appropriate place in the national food, fibre and fodder production and the State’s economy is sustained without any depletion through erosion, degradation or overuse. |
 The
information and knowledge of soils of the state which could be gained through the study of
their physical and chemical properties and their geographical distribution pattern, is an
essential prerequisite for their proper utilisation, management and conservation. It also
helps in proper selection of crops and better land use. When seen in detail at village level, the soils of Rajasthan are complex and highly variable, reflecting a verity of differing parent materials, physiographic land features, range of distribution of rainfall and its effects, etc. However, broadly, the soils can be put in five major groups, based on the basic fabric of soils i.e. soil texture which governs its many other properties. They are,
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