food and land resources

ENVIRONMENTAL

STUDY

FOOD AND LAND

RESOURCES

• DHAVAL JALALPARA A.

INTRODUCTION

• Food is one of the basic requirement of human being, it is the

most important material that our body needs for its proper

functioning and well being at all stages of our life.

• Human diet is not rusticated to any special category of food.

• Man eats a variety of foods, plant and animal origin; as no

single food provides us with all the nutrients that we need.

SOURCES OF FOOD

• Although the earth has perhaps 30,000 plant species with parts that

people can eat, only 15 plants and 8 animal species supply 90% of our

food.

• Our main food resources are

1. Agricultural crops (mainly rice,wheat,potato,soyabean,millet, etc.)

2. Domesticated animals (cattle, sheep, goat, etc.)

3. Aquaculture (fish and sea food)

GLOBAL/WORLD FOOD

PROBLEMS

• During last 50 years food production has increased by about 50%. But at

the same time the population growth rate in less development countries has

out stripped food production.

• The international commission on Irrigation and Drainage estimated that

current food production would have to double within the next 25 years.

• The FAO estimated that about 840 million people remain chronically

hungry , nearly 820 million of them in the developing countries. There are

two generally two kind of food problems across the world.

(1) Undernourishment

(2) Malnutrition

UNDERNOURISHMENT

• It is the lack of sufficient calories in available food, so

that one has little or no ability to move or work.

• The FAO estimates that the average minimum daily

caloric intake over the whole world is about 2500 calories per day.

• People who receive less than 90% of their minimum

dietary intake on a long term basis are considered

undernourishment.

MALNOURISHMENT

• Malnourishment is the lack of specific components of

food such as proteins, vitamins or essential chemical elements.

• It is due to nutritional imbalance caused by a lack of

specific dietary components or an inability to absorb or utilize

essential nutrients.

Major problems due to malnutrition

1. MARASMUS :

2. KWASHIORKAR :

3. ANEMIA :

4. GOITER AND HYPOTHYROIDISM :

5. PELLAGRA :

6. CHRONIC HUNGER :

STEP TO IMPROVE FOOD

PRODUCTION

1. Available land acreage should be properly and judiciously utilized.

2. Soil fertility should be increased through wise use of fertilizers and organic

manures.

3. Mixed cropping should be practiced wherever possible .

4. Crop rotation should be done.

5. Soil erosion and loss of nutrients should be prevented by maintaining

vegetation cover throughout the year.

6. High yield and disease resistant plant varieties should be introduce.

7. Integrated and balance use of available water sources should be made

8. Weeds and pest should be efficiently controlled, integrated pest

control practices should be preferred over the total reliance on chemical

pesticides.

9. Combining use of traditional methods/ equipment's with modern

methods of agriculture.

ENVIRONMENTAL

EFFECTS/IMPACTS

OF AGRICULTURE

IMPACTS OF TRADITIONAL

AGRICULTURE ON ENVIRONMENT

The main impacts of this type of agriculture are as follows:

1. DEFORESTATION :

2. SOIL EROSION :

3. DEPLETION OF NUTRIENT :

IMPACTS OF MODERN AGRICULTURE

ON ENVIRONMENT

1) Fertilizer related problems

(a) Micronutrient imbalance :

Most of the chemical fertilizers used in modern agriculture have nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium(N,P,K)which are essential micronutrient.

(b) NITRATE POLLUTION :

Nitrogen fertilizers applied to the fields often leach deep into the soil and ultimately contaminate the ground water.

(c) EURORPHICATION :

Excessive use of N and P fertilizers causes problems related to the water bodies like lakes.

2) Problems related to pesticides

(a) Biological magnification :

(b) Death of non target organisms :

(c) Creating resistance in pests and producing new pests:

3) Water Logging :

Over irrigation of croplands by the farmers for

good growth of their crop usually leads to the water logging.

Preventing excessive irrigation, sub-surface

drainage technology and bio-drainage with trees like eucalyptus

are some of the remedial measures to prevent water logging.

4) Salinity problems :

A major causes of Stalinization of soil is excessive irrigation.

About 20% of the world’s croplands receive irrigation with canal water or

ground water which unlike lake water often contains dissolved salts.

Under dry climate, the water evaporates leaving behind salts in

the upper layer of the soil.

Most of the crops cannot tolerate high salinity so the yield of

the crop decreases.

LAND RESOURCES

• LAND AS A RESOURCES

Land is finite and important resources for mankind and other organisms. Most human or natural activities need space for their development.

This space is provided by land .

Lithosphere plays an important role as it not only produces food for human beings and animals, but also the decomposition of organic matter is carried out by a host of microorganisms in the soil.

Various uses of land are-

1. Food Production ( agriculture )

2. Houses the living species, the water resources and raw materials resources

3. Industrial purpose

4. Residential purpose

5. Commercial purpose

6. Waste disposal

7. Energy purpose

LAND USE PATTERN

Though the pattern of land use varies from country to country; broadly the pattern of land use on earth is :

Agriculture(arable)land…………………..11%

Pastures and meadows…………………...22%

Forest land………………………………30%

Urban and non-agriculture………………37%

• In INDIA more than two-fifth land is

agricultural land. The pattern of land

distribution in INDIA is as under• Agricultural land……………………………43.6%

• Permanent pastures and meadows………….14.6%

• Culturable wastelands………………………12.2%

• Forests……………………………………...10.7%

• Barren and inculturable land………………..8.4%

• Urban land…………………………………5.3%

• No information available……………….......5.2%

REFERENCE

• B. R. SHAH