Search results for "Land degradation"

The interdisciplinary nature of <i>SOIL</i>

2015

Abstract. The holistic study of soils requires an interdisciplinary approach involving biologists, chemists, geologists, and physicists, amongst others, something that has been true from the earliest days of the field. In more recent years this list has grown to include anthropologists, economists, engineers, medical professionals, military professionals, sociologists, and even artists. This approach has been strengthened and reinforced as current research continues to use experts trained in both soil science and related fields and by the wide array of issues impacting the world that require an in-depth understanding of soils. Of fundamental importance amongst these issues are biodiversity,…

An economic, perception and biophysical approach to the use of oat straw as mulch in Mediterranean rainfed agriculture land

2017

[EN] Soil erosion is a key cause of land degradation in agriculture lands; and it is a worldwide threat that must be solved by means of nature-based strategies to be able to achieve sustainability. The use of mulches can be a solution, but there is a lack of information on long-term effects of the use of straw. Furthermore, little is known about the perception of farmers and the economic cost on the implantation of straw as a conservation measure. Eight paired plots were selected in Sierra de Enguera on an agriculture field to determine the effect of straw cover on soil erosion. Four plots were tilled three times per year (Control) and four plots were not ploughed and 0.125 kg m(-2) y(-1) o…

Risk assessment of land degradation (RALDE) model

2021

Reversing land degradation through grasses: a systematic meta-analysis in the Indian tropics

2017

Abstract. Although intensive agriculture is necessary to sustain the world's growing population, accelerated soil erosion contributes to a decrease in the environmental health of ecosystems at local, regional and global scales. Reversing the process of land degradation using vegetative measures is of utmost importance in such ecosystems. The present study critically analyzes the effect of grasses in reversing the process of land degradation using a systematic review. The collected information was segregated under three different land use and land management situations. Meta-analysis was applied to test the hypothesis that the use of grasses reduces runoff and soil erosion. The effect of gra…

Land degradation a matter of attitude? A case study from southern Transylvania (Romania)

2016

A better public perception and knowledge on land degradation increases the individual and collective responsibility in land use and land management. Based on interviews, this paper presents results of evaluation of public perception and attitude towards degrading phenomena in the central part of Romania, an area prone to geomorphologic processes, with different land uses and a high proportion of degraded land. The research reveals natural causes, improper land use, categories of land owned, socio-economic causes and involvement of institutions as key aspects of public perception. Our research could be useful in the identification and design of measures in regional planning to attract popula…

Characterizing land condition variability in Ferlo, Senegal (2001–2009) using multi-temporal 1-km Apparent Green Cover (AGC) SPOT Vegetation data

2011

Abstract The ecosystem state or ‘land condition’ can be characterized by a set of attributes, which show variations at different temporal scales. A multi-resolution analysis (MRA) based on the wavelet transform (WT) has been implemented to examine the land condition of a dryland region in Ferlo (Senegal) over the period 2001–2009. This methodology has proven to be useful for smoothing time series while considering those temporal resolutions that incorporate information about the vegetation dynamics. For this purpose, time series of the 1-km Apparent Green Cover (AGC) from the 10-day composites SPOT Vegetation (VGT) data are analyzed. Two relevant outputs from the MRA, A 1 (de-noised) and th…

2019

Gully erosion is considered to be one of the main causes of land degradation in arid and semi-arid territories around the world. In this research, gully erosion susceptibility mapping was carried out in Semnan province (Iran) as a case study in which we tested the efficiency of the index of entropy (IoE), the Vlse Kriterijumska Optimizacija I Kompromisno Resenje (VIKOR) method, and their combination. Remote sensing and geographic information system (GIS) were used to reduce the time and costs needed for rapid assessment of gully erosion. Firstly, a gully erosion inventory map (GEIM) with 206 gully locations was obtained from various sources and randomly divided into two groups: A training d…

Soil erosion after land abandonment in a semiarid environment of southeastern Spain

1997

Different soil units were selected in southeastern Spain to investigate the effects of land abandonment on soil erosion under semiarid conditions. The study sites selected were a cultivated field (bare), a 3‐yr‐abandoned field (herbs), a 10‐yr‐abandoned field (Artemisia herba‐alba Asso.), and two soil units covered with semi‐native (Stipa tena‐cissima L) and native (Pinus halepensis Miller) vegetation. Simulated rainfall measurements showed that the erosion and runoff increased after the land abandonment, but later erosion decreased owing to the influence of increasing vegetation. Runoff discharge (35%) and the erosion rates (334 g m2 h‐1) were high in the 3‐yr‐abandoned land in comparison …

Moving Ahead from Assessments to Actions by Using Harmonized Risk Assessment Methodologies for Soil Degradation

2010

Almost all developed countries use risk assessment methodologies (RAMs) for the evaluation of risks related to soil degradation, viz. soil organic matter decline, erosion, landslides, salinization and/or compaction. However and for various reasons, seldom the use of such RAMs seldom results in actual measures to combat soil degradation in practice. In this study the current status of RAMs in EU-27 was evaluated and factors hampering the implementation of action plans were explored. To do so we used a so-called risk assessment chain, which describes the five successive steps of any risk assessment for soil threats viz., (1) notion of the threat, (2) data collection, (3) data processing, (4) …

The role of vegetation on gully erosion stabilization at a severely degraded landscape: A case study from Calhoun Experimental Critical Zone Observat…

2018

Abstract Gully erosion was evidence of land degradation in the southern Piedmont, site of the Calhoun Critical Zone Observatory (CCZO), during the cotton farming era. Understanding of the underlying gully erosion processes is essential to develop gully erosion models that could be useful in assessing the effectiveness of remedial and soil erosion control measures such as gully backfilling, revegetation, and terracing. Development and validation of process-based gully erosion models is difficult because observations of the formation and progression of gullies are limited. In this study, analytic formulations of the two dominant gullying processes, namely, plunge pool erosion and slab failure…