Page 136 - SST Class 08

sufficient for a tropical country like India, LAND DEGRADATION
where the optimum area required under
forests should be 33 percent of the total area.
Forests
2. Net Sown Area : If the ‘Fallow Land’ is
brought under cultivation, it will increase the
net sown area. The ‘Net Sown Area’ will be
about 54 percent of the total reporting area.
The prosperity in agricultural sector depends
more on the percentage of ‘Net Sown Area’
to the total reporting area than on the total
net ‘Sown Area’.
3. Barren and Wasteland: Rocky, arid and
desert areas are put under this category.
Barren and wasteland are concentrated in
the states of Assam, Gujarat, Manipur,
Mizoram, Rajasthan and Sikkim.
4. Area Under Non-Agricultural Use :
Buildings, roads, rail lines, rivers, canal,
industries are included in this category. Non-
Agricultural uses are dominant in the
densely populated and urban areas, more
than 98 percent of the reporting area of
Chennai is under such uses.
5. Permanent Pastures and Grazing
Lands : The area under this category is
decreasing. Pastures are being converted
into agricultural fields. The area presently
under pastures and grazing lands in not
sufficient for the large population of live-
stock in the country.
Social Science-8 136
Land is a very important natural resource, but
due to personal greed human beings have
degraded land. Human activities have also
boosted the pace of natural forces to degraded
damage land.
Land degradation occurs in the following chief
ways :
1. Modification of Landforms : Man, today
is capable of raising to ground high hills or
fill up deep depression. Dams across rivers,
mining, construction of houses, bridges and
roads affect landforms directly. Over-
exploitation of underground water leads to
subsidence as does coal mining. Man
created landscapes that have negative
impact on environment resulting in land
degradation.
2. Deforestation : Deforestation refers to the
removal of forest cover where the land is
thereafter converted to a non-forest use. The
loss of the forest cover results change in the
climatic condition and also affects the
biodiversity which in turn threatens the life
of the people. Deforestation comes in many
forms, including forest fires, ranching and
development, unsustainable logging for
timber, clear-cutting for agriculture and
degradation due to climate change.
Deforestation