Soil conservation strategies in the Third World

Excerpt

I want to make two points. First, if you think you have problems in making soil conservation work in the United States, spare a thought for countries in the Third World, where the problems are much worse and the difficulties of applying the solutions are much greater. Second, you must get it right, because if soil conservation cannot be made to work effectively in the United States, with all the advantage of research, extension, and conservation services, plus wealthy, educated farmers on good land with a gentle climate—if with all these benefits conservation is not successful—then what hope is there for struggling countries that have few, or none, of these advantages?

Physical problems

The erosivity of rainfall From a number of studies around the world, we can get an approximate picture of erosivity. This information needs to be treated with caution for two reasons. First, most of the calculations are based on the erosivity (EI) index, and it is by no means certain that this empirical index, derived from U.S. data, is appropriate in other climates. Second, most of the studies were based on the old system (13) that exaggerates the erosivity of high-intensity …