Desiccation in Africa

Abstract

A SUPPLEMENT to the Journal of the Royal African Society of January entitled "The Man-made Desert Africa: Erosion and Drought" by Prof. E. P. Stebbing offers yet another warning that in many parts of the world drifting sand and eroding soil are beginning seriously to clog the wheels of adminis trative machinery. Erosion is a matter in which African Governments interfere unwillingly, for' effective control often means uprooting social, agricultural and religious customs upon which tribal life, which British Governments strive to preserve, is based. In this paper, Stebbing regards erosion primarily from the point of view of its effect on water supplies, and believes that with increasing erosion, a falling water-table and decreasing water supplies, the character of tjb.e rainfall deteriorates, wet years becoming less, and droughts more frequent, and of longer duration. When deterioration has reached what Stebbing terms the "intermittent rain fall stage", where continuous agriculture is scarcely feasible, man has his last chance to change his methods and prevent the, final encroachment of the, desert. Much of Africa'seems to have entered upon this critical stage of deterioration, and some parts have passed it irrevocably. Stebbing emphasizes that now "it is for the Administration to act". The immediate needs for Africa's conservation are more money and more officers trained to the work. Given these, administrations might put into operation soiP conservation programmes which, if carried out, would turn the scales, at or before the internpdttent rainfall stage, against the desert's encroachment. The trouble is that we cannot tell, until we have tried them out, whether plans for soil conservation are compatible with plans for the harmonious social development of whites and blacks.