Soil erosion is a hazard traditionally associated with agriculture in tropical and semi-arid areas. In recent years, however, its importance has become apparent in areas devoted to forestry, transport and recreation. Moreover, erosion is increasingly being recognized as a hazard in temperate countries such as Britain, Belgium and Germany. Conservation measures depend upon a thorough understanding of the mechanics of the erosion processes. This book is the first text to concentrate on soil erosion, a subject which is usually covered only briefly in books on soil conservation. The mechanics of erosion are reviewed in the first part of the book with emphasis on the extent of and deficiencies in current knowledge. Techniques of classifying land with respect to erosion risk are also examined and a simple working method is presented. A discussion of various approaches to modelling soil erosion focuses on the value of models for pedicting rates of soil loss and planning conservation work. Strategies for erosion control are related to the changes that man can make to the soil, plant cover and slope of the land and the effect that these have on the mechanics of erosion. The themes developed in the first part of the book are integrated in a case study of erosion risk evaluation and conservation planning in peninsular Malaysia. Here the application of erosion mapping, land classification, erosion modelling and conservation systems is described in practice. Attention is given to working with scarce data using remote sensing and detailed field survey.
