A global perspective

Maurice G. Cook

Excerpt

Perhaps the greatest justification for being concerned about land degradation, and all the concomitant consequences resulting from it, is a genuine humanitarian spirit. We are moved by scenes of starving children, persons ravaged by disease, and people displaced by drought and flooding. Land is fundamental to supplying basic human needs. Therefore, good soil and water management is essential for bringing about a productive and sustainable agriculture to undergird a given population.

The global picture of population growth and food production is not encouraging. At the 1982 meeting of the Soil Conservation Society of America (now Soil and Water Conservation Society), Dr. Rudy Dudal of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations presented FAO projections of population growth and the consequential world food demand. With a world population of 4.4 billion in 1980, FAO projected a world population of 6.2 billion in 2000. That projection was right on target. The growth in population increased world food demand by almost 50 percent. I doubt that sufficient adjustments were made in quantity and quality of agricultural land during the twenty-year period to attain large increases in food production.

The 1980 FAO projections are more alarming when we ...

Footnotes

Maurice G. Cook, is a professor emeritus of soil conservation at North Carolina State University, Raleigh, and a past-president of the Soil and Water Conservation Society. He is a member of the board of directors for the International Soil Conservation Organization and has been active in soil and water conservation work in many countries during his career.
Copyright 2003 by the Soil and Water Conservation Society

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