VANISHING SOIL

Opotiki News, Volume I, Issue 69, 12 August 1938, Page 4

VANISHING SOIL

WORLD WIDE*; PROBLEM ' , - ' •••- ’ “DESERT FOLLOWS MAN” ; ‘ ' v';;-; 1 -: "• ; V'-'-’ .y--r LESSONS OF . ' INTERESTING TALK , ■V .* ' ■;' '•' ''V . f * / , ’ “It must not be supposed that tlie largo cities which have been uncover-. ed by archaeologists in North Africa and the Bible laiute'. were built upon the desert. At their prime they were the centres’ of fertile areas.; / •Several’oi the earliest' civilisations? were, simply swallowed up beileath. tlie Sands which they themselves invited, w said Mr O. G. Thornton, district engineer of the Public Works addressing Gisborne Rotarians to-day on the subject; of “Our Vanishing Soil.” „/

In a thought-provoking' address,; Mr Thornton pointed' to the lesspns of archaeology' and of the more recent historical periods concerning the fate of nations which allowed their fertility of soil to waste and vanish.: , :

On the basis of these examples, and also, of the evidence which■ every; river in the district has been: providing for some months, lie : founded . a warning of what must, eventually;befall the civilisation-of' to-day unless conservation of the soil is on a scale far beyond anything vet attempted in this generation.

Penalties of Deforestation.

The penalties of denudation of natural forest areas, without compensating planting designed to prevent the development of swift erosion, were outlined by the speaker by reference to what had happened in various parts of the older world. Aneieut Greece, he said, was at-its > peak/a very different land from the barren rocky peninsula of tofday. The fertile Greek soil provided a rich medium to nourish the Greek culture. 'J 07 day it seemed that a large part of the soil has disappeared, and that; the country would never again produce the surplus wealth .necessary to "the support of a great nation.

The African deserts were continually expanding, lie continued, buv A their encroachment on the formerly: fertile lands only followed where man had done his worst by exposing the rich ground to erosion by the 'weather. ' 1 Central African countries provided: similar evidence of the -progress- ofdenudation of the soil, vast areas having been eroded down to tlje, stfb-

' Vi:- V* • Ni',V< -r.-V •. t ,..y , ■ ; soil and the native . populations : placed in peril. South African j, farmers* have spent £2 ; dapis and antierosion.'measures" in . two. . ' > * '" -/. China’s great' Yellow River got its characteristic colour the- huge / quantities ;. of ' soil . which it brought 'down- from the uplands in the iiorrh-, west Of Chinay where great-tracts of land were being converted into liroivh' and barren hills, -bare of ;all vegeta•tioii and- uninhabited.’ It was tp Chi-; 11a, however,' that,the world. owed its first examples .in the greatest of all. positive.measures for erosion control —-terra’eing: ' 1 • ’

«. Saving the Rich Sjoil. The speaker dealt ; bneljy with; -the examplesof Japan find • Java in - tlie exploitation of terracing g and planthaving saved . its', rich ' volcanic /soil to/sueh. good purpose that 30,000,006' 'people continue- to exist after ' thousands of; years' of occupation 'in. a land no; bigger than ' the North, Island of New Zealand. France furnished an example of 1 the .penal-; ■ties. of deforestation, which following . the Revolution:; led to disastrous and numerous floods.

Ffonr tlie y experiences of' Aiistrar:j lia arid; the; United States, Mr Thornton drew parallels for the iirec-esscs Which were taking place 111 New Zealand, ; He stated that in Australia; such concern, was felt regarding sod; erosion that the Bank of iNew South. Wales liad -issued a booklet on pro-, ventive measures which should be in' the hands . of every hill -’armor throughout this Dominion;.inythej United -States, 25 pier- cent. ‘rifgalLtligj cultivable land in- the Mississippi; Va 1-! ley; had been stripped to the sub-soil;j and in tlie corn belt of lowa erosion; Was .proceeding. so ; -fsisT; that the ; soil’ would all be gone it wasj estiinated.’ ... ■?•■■■■;■■ y o—f ' ••• • ; Effects iri the United States. . j Partly;;as a result of the declining] fertility of the ’ soil, nearly 1,000,000 families on farms in'the .United' States; hail been living, in abject-; I poverty. Erosion was riot the sole caiiggi: of' this* poverty,; but irifw was no Coincidence j djt inhere yo: vjrcy Was; greatest, erosion and povt rty went] hand in hand. . >' j j ' After referring to the major effects; df soil eriisidn in the United States, 'Mt 'Tliofiitori: turned to the position in fhis ; : Dominion, pointing out that the same processes must follow deforestation ahd . -intensive cultivation and grazing l here. ' - - ; l 1 -At .the Conclusion, of liisj address-. which included comments t pun the best means of limiting ’'the yiatmal process' rilf; SqJJ. ■ erosion, Mr j ’i'iointon

was accorded a hearty vote of thanks ( on the motion of the president of the Rotary Club, Mr J. 0. Musgrave. Tlie _ latter expressed the hope that the dangers emphasised by Mr, Thornton : : would he widely appreciac?d, and that • they -would live to see something ef-fective-being done to curb the natural processes of . soil erosion in New ■ Zealand. "V'>-