Forages are the backbone of livestock industry in any country and so is the case of United Arab Emirates where in addition to significant forage import local forage production is also gaining significant importance to control forage quality through organic farming. The soils of the UAE are dominantly sandy and infertile and hence show poor physical, chemical and fertility properties, suggesting frequent irrigation and replenishment of nutrients based on crop requirement. Among other forages alfalfa is grown in many farms. Alfalfa is salt sensitive crop (threshold salinity-ECe 2 dS/m) and could not tolerate high water salinity levels which is the general case of most of the agricultural farms in the UAE. Considering the salt-sensitive nature of alfalfa it is imperative to grow alfalfa in areas where there is sufficient recharge of the aquifer and water salinity is acceptable level. In other case local alfalfa can be grown with desalinated water if the purpose is to control the forage quality and direct feeding of fresh forage to camels and horses and through adopting organic farming technology. It is to be noted that a comparison between crop yield from organic and conventional farming cannot be compared, due to the use of heavy chemicals and fertilizers in the latter case. However, there are various options if properly adopted the health of sandy soils can be improved through enhancing soil quality using natural soil amendments like AustraBlend Multi Mineral Root Zone Conditioner (ABMMRZC) mined from Australia and adopting 4R nutrient stewardship as well as seed inoculation with rhizobium and mycorrhizae application. In this papers all possible options to increase alfalfa production including seed inoculation, mycorrhizae application, eradication of weeds, proper soil preparation, irrigation and nutrient management, remediation of autotoxication, growing high yield varieties, harvesting method have been briefed to enhance alfalfa in existing farms and to introduce in new farms with clear objective. Growing alfalfa locally have two very clear benefits compared to imported ones, that is, control on the quality of alfalfa forage and saving of financial resources with less import and ready availability of fresh fodder without hay making.
