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Slash and burn
1. Slash
and
Burn
R.B.D.A.V. Sr. Sec. Public School Presented by : Aashish goyal,
Bathinda
2. What
is Slash and Burn?
Slash-and-burn is an agricultural technique which
involves cutting and burning of forests or woodlands to
create fields. It is subsistence agriculture that typically
uses little technology or other tools. It is typically part
of shifting cultivation agriculture.
Slash-and-burn techniques are used by
between 200 and 500 million people
worldwide. In 2004 it was estimated that,
in Brazil alone, 500,000 small farmers
were each clearing an average of one
hectare of forest per year's, and of
transhumance livestock herding.
3. How
slash and burn would has originated?
It is kind of natural. Supposedly when lightning would
strike the dead trees a forest fire would start and
burn down everything. Our ancestors realized that
the land left behind from that fire was extremely
fertile after a while. It was now able to grow crops on
that land. So are ancestors opted it as a good method
and started clearing land by burning and cultivating
crops on it.
4. How
is it done?
• Field is cleared by cutting down vegetation; plants
that provide food or timber are left standing.
• The downed vegetation is allowed to dry until just
before the rainiest part of the year to ensure an
effective burn.
• The plot of land is burned to remove vegetation,
drive away pests, and provide a burst of nutrients
for planting.
• Crops are cultivated directly in the ashes left after
the burn.
5. Benefits
to farmers
Slash and burn agriculture has proven more
sustainable and about as productive as more
modern, energy-intensive agricultural methods.
In contrast, modern mechanized agriculture often
results in large areas planted in a monocrop and
requires the removal of almost all trees. But in
slash and burn agriculture same land can be used
to grow multiple crops together. Also crops can
be cultivated at input of Rs 600 per year. Crops
yielded from this are good.
6. Disadvantages
to our environment
• Deforestation: When practiced by large populations, when fields are not
given sufficient time for vegetation to grow back, there is a temporary or
permanent loss of forest cover.
• Erosion: When fields are slashed, burned, and cultivated next to each
other in rapid succession, roots and temporary water storages are lost and
unable to prevent nutrients from leaving the area permanently.
• Nutrient Loss: For the same reasons, fields may gradually lose the fertility
they once had. The result may be desertification, a situation in which land
is infertile and unable to support growth of any kind.
• Biodiversity Loss: When plots of land area cleared, the various plants and
animals that lived there are swept away. If a particular area is the only
one that holds a particular species, slashing and burning could result in
extinction for that species. Because slash and burn agriculture is often
practiced in tropical regions where biodiversity is extremely high,
endangerment and extinction may be magnified.
7. Is there any alternative to
slash and burn
Answer to this question is a yes. Global associations are trying to
prevent slash and burn and they have given us some ways. One of
them is crop rotation. In this crops are changed after a season. It
gives us different crops replenishes soil fertility and is pollution free.
But the only problem with that is that you still have to destroy a
part of the land to get the field for the crops. The other way is
growing profitable trees in rows with an annual crop in between.
The key to that is each plant must benefit the health/ growth of the
other. An example would be planting walnut trees in rows with soy
beans. The soy fixes nitrogen that the walnuts will benefit from and
the walnuts provide some means of protection from the wind/
weather.
8. ConclusioN
At the end I say that Slash and burn
agriculture was a good discovery by our
ancestors which gave a lot of benefits to
humans. But with changing times
population, needs of people and everything
else is increasing. With which slash and burn
agriculture can’t be carried on and is now
becoming destructive. So new alternatives
are needed to be discovered which good for
present times and take place of slash and
burn successfully.
