WHY SOIL AND WATER CONSERVATION
Land and Water are natural resources that are essential for the existence of life and are the two variable factors for which management has become most essential.
Nature's scar forever ..... Land slip due to intensive bun cultivation |
Land provides food, fuel, fodder and shelter besides supporting secondary and other economic life supporting system. However there has been a continuous depletion of land resources and the quality of land is deteriorating due to various factors like soil erosion caused mainly due to shifting cultivation, large scale deforestation, reckless mining activities, overgrazing, general mismanagement etc. Such soil erosion lead to degradation of soils’ physical property and loss of plant nutrients.
|
It takes nature 600 –1000 years to build 2.5 cm of top soil but get displaced in a year due to misuse, as a result it become the harmful single factor in the deterioration of productive land. It has been reported that 6000 million tones of productive soil is lost every year from about 80 million hectare of cultivated land alone in India .It has also been proved that soil lost from unprotected land is about 120 tonnes /ha/yr and may go as high as 300 tonnes /ha/yr.
|
Thus, a part from depletion of fertile soil erosion results in the loss of run-off water, plant nutrients and micro flora, siltation of reservoirs and riverbeds thereby adversely affecting irrigation and power potential; causing floods in plain and valley which damage crops, animals, habitation, communication etc. But most of all it adversely affect agricultural production, forest production and availability of water both for irrigation and drinking besides bringing about a disturbance in the soil and water balance. |
Severe soil erosion due to unscientific stone quarrying and faulty cultivation in the hill slopes |