XI WORLD FORESTRY CONGRESS Antalya, Turkey, 13 to 22 October 1997
	VOLUME 2, TOPIC 9 SUMMARIES OF VOLUNTARY PAPERS IMPROVING PRODUCTIVITY OF SODIC SOILS Krishna Govind Prasad 1 The past few decades have witnessed a sharp degradation in the quality of soil resources in India. According to Abrol (1990) forests and grasslands which have a vital role in providing and maintaining ecosystems so essential for agriculture and livestock have been fast degrading. India has 15% of the world's population and only 2% of the world's forest area. The per capita growing stock is 5.2 m3 against the world average of 46.7 m3 and the per capita availability of forest areas is only 0.08 ha against the world average of 1.0 ha. Interpretation of satellite imagery has shown that the country might be left with only about 8 to 10% of its geographical area under closed forests, in contrast to the figure of 33% recommended as minimum for ecological security by the National Commission on Agriculture. The country's requirements, including fuel and industrial wood, in 1980 were reported to be around 200 million m3 and according to the National Commission on Agriculture, these requirements will rise to 300 million m3. Thus, unless the yield and production can be increased considerably, over-exploitation, further resource depletion and environmental degradation are inevitable. Future strategies will, therefore, need to address problems, not only of aggregate food production and nutritional security of the people, but also the regional imbalances and improvement of the socio-economic conditions of the majority of the rural population whose existence is based on rain-fed agriculture and non-wood forest products. Future increases in production must come entirely through biological reclamation of degraded soil and problem areas. To reach this aim, concerted efforts will be required to develop technologies for optimum utilization of larger fraction of soils having one or more soil-related constraints. 1 Scientist ­ SF, Division of Forest Soil and Land Reclamation, Forest Research Institute, Dehradun 248006, India. Facsimile: (91 135) 756865; E-mail: icfremis@x400.nicgw.nic.in FOREST RESOURCES IN WATERSHED PERSPECTIVE Hikmat Ramdan1, Endang Hilmi 1 Forests have important roles in the support of sustainable watershed management, leading to both tangible and intangible benefits. Sustainable forests mean sustainable watersheds. Efforts to improve the valuation of forest resources should be made through an evaluation of all forest components. Knowing the real value of forest-land resources will reduce the large-scale conversion of such land and thus the conversion will be done very carefully. In watershed perspective, forest resources have more tangible than intangible benefits. Implementing land-use plans, strengthening political will, and the health watershed model are some recommendations towards attaining a healthy and sustainable watershed. Keywords: Forest functions, watershed perspective, forest valuation. 1 Faculty of Forestry, University of Winaya Mukti, Jl. Winaya Mukti 1, Jatinangor Sumedang, Indonesia.Facsimile: (62 22) 798260 Previous Section Next Section   Download the Pdf file for this topic (195 K) What is a Pdf file ?   Back to Top of the page
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