Soil erosion due to accelerating runoff in various land cover types pose a serious threat to the long term sustainability of the fragile Himalayan landscape characterized by subsistence farming. Delimitation of high runoff zones, fostering soil erosion in the agricultural dominated watersheds is thus a necessity for watershed managers, NGO’s, urban planners, policy makers, and municipal administrations. The approach is practical, SWAT is a straightforward modeling system using GIS information. The BMP is also a very practical approach to mitigation of runoff accumulation on sub basin.

Climate change, deforestation and the fate of Amazon. Understanding and mitigation the impact of the increasing population and global economic activities on tropical forests is one of the greatest challenges for scientists and policy makers. A summary of some of the latest findings and thinking on this topic has been reported by Malhi and colleagues in a recent paper published on Science. An overview and comments on this paper is herein proposed.

Water has been identified as a key resource for Nepal's economic growth. Although the country has 225 billion cubic meters of water available annually, less than 7% has been utilized. Climate change is a frequent topic in national development discussions in part because of its possible impact on future water availability. This study assessed the likely impact of climate change on water resources development in the Koshi River basin, Nepal, using the Soil and Water Assessment Tool to generate projections for the 2030s and 2050s.

The first changes of drained peat soils on the territory of the Republic of Belarus appeared after hydro technical amelioration in 60-70s of XX century. Nowadays the process of transformation of component composition of soil cover of old-reclaimed soils and increase of degradation of peat soil is going on. The paper demonstrates the results of systematization and generalization of the materials appropriate to the completion of soil-cartographic works on the drained and adjacent lands of agricultural organizations of the republic.

66 pp. Includes maps, charts and tables. Bookmarks supplied by UO. Published September 1999. Captured December 30, 2005.

Land use change is estimated to have generated 17% of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions in the 2000s, a large part coming from deforestation. The main driver of these emissions is expansion of agricultural activities, for the need of local development in tropical regions. However, they have also been caused by the dynamics of globalisation which has stimulated agricultural trade flows. Thus, today, there are new concerns with respect to how agricultural policies are influencing land use changes in other parts of the world through international market responses.