ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with the methods that are available, first, to assess the degree of perturbation of the "natural balance" caused by human land use activities and, second, to assess the capacity of the natural environment to tolerate human land use activities without significant detriment to its regenerative capabilities. It discusses impact assessment techniques as they are currently developed and the progress that has been made toward assessing the inherent capacity of the environment to accommodate development. Journalists and scientists have been joined in the effort to popularize the significance of environmental issues by a number of public officials as well. Most of the assessment techniques involve the completion of a matrix in which existing environmental characteristics and conditions are listed along one axis and proposed actions that may have an environmental impact along the other axis. Progress toward the development of valid and useful methods for determining an area's environmental carrying capacity has been slow.
