Demonstration Areas
Two
billion of
the 13 billion hectares of the Earth's land, including most of the arable
land, are eroded as a result of overgrazing, stripping the land of trees and
vegetation, and poor farming practice. 75% of the eroded land is in Africa,
Asia and Latin America (UNEP, 1992). The dramatic increase in population of
the last several decades throughout the developing countries of Africa,
Asia, and Latin America put extreme pressure on the land. All the good land
and much of the marginal land, which is much more susceptible to erosion,
was put under production. The size of family farms declined as farmers
divided their land among their children. Farmers worked the land harder,
soils and pastures eroded, productivity declined, and farmers worked the
land even harder. Several developing countries have conducted poverty
studies in the last few years, and the majority classified 80 to 90% of
their rural populations as poor compared to only 30 to 40% of the urban
population. The problems of rural poverty and soil erosion are inextricably
connected. Each problem is a cause of the other, and neither can be solved
without also solving the other.
SID develops and promotes innovative methods for solving the twin problems of rural poverty and erosion of farmland. Some of these methods are:
-
helping
farmers assess markets and make and use business plans, -
making the reclamation of soils and pastures and increasing income co-equal goals,
-
helping farmers make simple, sustainable soil reclamation techniques part of standard agricultural practice,
-
using competitions among communities to mobilize participation and recognize and reward changes in farming practice,
-
employing successful farmers as well as agronomists as extension agents,
-
employing women as well as men as extension agents and making equal participation of women a condition of all extension services.
