Hammecker Claude auteur aut IRD Van Asten P. auteur aut IRD Marlet S. auteur aut IRD Maeght Jean-Luc auteur aut IRD Poss Roland auteur aut IRD text journalArticle eng text/pdf born digital access In Sahelian countries, agriculture often relies on irrigation especially for rice cropping which has been introduced these last decades. As most of the water resources used for irrigation (mainly rivers and lakes) have an alkaline composition, rice cropping is often held as responsible for soil alkalinization. In order to evaluate the probability for this process to occur, we studied 3 different sites in West Africa where numerical simulation of the geochemical interactions between soil, irrigation water and groundwater were performed with PHREEQC. It was possible to simulate the evaporation of the ponding water, the mixing between groundwater and irrigation water, the lateral drainage (flushing) and the leaching, and finally the management of the crop residues. By performing prospective simulations over 60 cropping cycles it has been shown that soil alkalinization and sodication are not inevitable in these areas especially if the cropping is properly managed. Moreover, when straw is removed and the plot flushed before the new cropping season, alkaline soils can even be improved with rice cropping. specialized Alkalinization Sodication PHREEQC Plant uptake Water management West Africa 068 076 150 1-2 129-140 2009 0016-7061 https://www.documentation.ird.fr/hor/fdi:010046038 10.1016/j.geoderma.2008.12.024 0016-7061 [F B010046038] https://www.documentation.ird.fr/hor/fdi:010046038 https://www.documentation.ird.fr/intranet/publi/2009/05/010046038.pdf Accès réservé (Intranet de l'IRD) IRD - Base Horizon / Pleins textes 2009-06-08 2017-08-23 fdi:010046038 fre