ABSTRACT
The protection and management of soil and water resources are the critical factors for success. Before discussing policies of watershed management and the evidence for their consequences, it is appropriate to summarize the reasons why the fate of watersheds in the tropics should indeed be a matter of concern to the whole international community. When the Club of Rome published The limits to growth in 1972, their challenging analysis of world trends evoked much complacent comment. Extrapolations were said to make poor predictions, while the improving technologies of food production were confidently expected to meet the needs of the growing human population. The 3-year drought that afflicted the African continent in the mid-1980s raised speculations about a change in world climate. Irrigation development usually occurs on valley floors and floodplains lying in the lower parts of the river systems. A solution can be reached only by the governments administering the threatened river valleys.
