ABSTRACT
Desertification is caused directly by four main types of poor land use: overcultivation, overgrazing, deforestation and poor irrigation practices. This chapter looks at each type, gives examples from different dryland areas, suggests the reasons for its occurrence, and describes the degradation which results. None of these types should be thought of as the dominant cause of desertification, since they are all interrelated, and a change in the location and intensity of one land use can affect other land uses some distance away. Moreover, as pointed out in the last chapter, poor land use is accelerated by drought, and is also greatly influenced by various underlying social, economic and political factors which, although mentioned in this chapter, will be discussed in more detail in Chapter 3.
