Record Details

Characterizing Natural Resources For Sustainable Agriculture In The Semi-Arid Tropics

OAR@ICRISAT

View Archive Info
 
 
Field Value
 
Relation http://oar.icrisat.org/4602/
 
Title Characterizing Natural Resources For Sustainable Agriculture In The Semi-Arid Tropics
 
Creator Virmani, S M
Eswaran, H
 
Subject Agriculture-Farming, Production, Technology, Economics
 
Description The natural resources of a country are its most sacred endowment. It
is a base on which all life depends and in most countries of the world, ia
the life support system of the country. In the recent past, with burgeoning
populations and the national goals of seeking sell-sufficiency in food and
fiher production, the resource base is slowly being stripped, often
ir~eversibly. The main result is man-induced degradation of land resources
through Inadvertent, inappropriate or misuse of technological innovations.
Even in the United States, until recently about 3 billion hectares of top
soil was lost annually with an economic cost of between 3 to 6 billion
dollars (Napier, 1986). Few estimates of the concomitant loss of soil
fertility are available. In Zimbabwe, a PA0 study indicated that on an
average, 1.6 million tons of nitrogen and 0.24 million tons of phosphorus
are lost per year through erosion and the cost to replace these nutrients
would exceed US$ 1.5 billion (Stocking, 1986). This is an amount which most
countries cannot afford for maintenance of their agricultural sector. When
degradation becomes a continuing process, yields decline and the farmer is
forced to eke a living on another piece of land, which in most instances
may be a fragile ecosystem -- steeplands or coastal swamps -- since much of
the better arable land is already under cultivation. The system then
brcollea iterative to the determinant of all.
 
Date 1990
 
Type Conference or Workshop Item
PeerReviewed
 
Format application/pdf
 
Language en
 
Rights —
 
Identifier http://oar.icrisat.org/4602/1/CP_540.pdf
Virmani, S M and Eswaran, H (1990) Characterizing Natural Resources For Sustainable Agriculture In The Semi-Arid Tropics. In: Proceedings of the International Symposium on Natural Resources Management for a Sustainable Agriculture, February 6-10, 1990, New Delhi, India.