Abstract
Soil erosion is the main soil degradation type; therefore, the extent of water-induced soil erosion in the state has been computed on the basis of soil resource map of the state. The data indicated that about 22 % of TGA of the state has annual soil loss less than 5 t ha−1, and this can be termed as very well within the tolerance limit. This area does not require any specific soil conservation measures. Improved land and crop production technologies need to be adopted for improving the productivity on sustainable basis. These areas are distributed in small patches in the entire state. About 7 and 5 % areas are experiencing annual soil loss in the range of 5.0–10.0 and 10.0–15.0 t ha−1, respectively. While slight erosion (5–10 t ha−1) class has been termed as within safe limit, yet this along with moderate erosion (10.0–15.0 t ha−1) class needs appropriate conservation measures to sustain the agricultural production from these areas of the state. These areas can be rehabilitated by adoption of low-input soil conservation measures, viz. land shaping, contour farming, field bunding, conservation tillage and introduction of erosion-resistant crops or cropping sequences. About 27 % area of the state has soil loss >15 t ha−1, and it includes moderately severe (15–20 t ha−1), severe (20–40 t ha−1), very severe (40–80 t ha−1) and extremely severe class (>80 t ha−1) having 3.75 %, 7.40 %, 5.74 % and 10.08 % area, respectively. These areas are concentrated in patches in the entire state, but no area of extremely severe erosion class is present in Hamirpur and Bilaspur districts. It has been deduced that the state experiences a total soil displacement to the tune of 258 M tonnes, out of which 83 % is contributed by 10 % area subjected to extremely severe erosion class. This area has been delineated in the map, and effective conservation measures here can not only cause marked reduction in soil loss but can pave way for regeneration of areas under other erosion classes.
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Acknowledgements
The authors convey their thanks to the staff of ICAR-NBSS&LUP and ICAR-IISWC for carrying the soil resource survey and computation of soil loss of grid observations. The critical review of the MS by reviewers and editors is thankfully acknowledged.
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Sidhu, G.S., Yadav, R.P. (2016). Soil Degradation in North-West Himalayas (NWH): A Case Study of Himachal Pradesh. In: Bisht, J., Meena, V., Mishra, P., Pattanayak, A. (eds) Conservation Agriculture. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-2558-7_15
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