Soil health and microbial diversity across land-use types: Evidence for agroecological management in peri-urban areas.

BACKGROUND: Land-use change profoundly influences soil microbial communities, yet its impacts on richness and diversity remain incompletely resolved across taxa. METHODS: Here, we characterized fungal and bacterial communities in soils from four contrasting land-use types-including crop, reforested, agroforestry, and uncultivated land-located in the same pedoclimatic conditions, using high-throughput amplicon sequencing of Internal Transcribed Spacer (ITS) and 16S ribosomal RNA (rRNA) genes. We quantified species richness and Shannon diversity and examined their relationships with key physicochemical parameters. RESULTS: Our results reveal that fungal and bacterial communities responded differently to land-use management. Fungal richness was highest in reforested soils, whereas bacterial richness was more uniformly distributed across land uses. Shannon diversity showed greater sensitivity than richness, suggesting that differences in the distribution of relative abundances among taxa contributed substantially to the observed patterns. Multivariate ordinations and correlation analyses further demonstrated that soil properties such as pH, total nitrogen, and cation exchange capacity were significant drivers of microbial community composition and diversity patterns. CONCLUSIONS: Our study provides new empirical evidence of how land management shapes biodiversity and informs strategies for enhancing soil health and ecosystem potential resilience.