Soil Conservation

The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that up to 56 million dollars in economic losses result from crop erosion in the U.S. each year. In some areas of Alabama, soil loss due to wind and rain erosion can be up to eight tons per acre per year! Wind erosion can be particularly problematic in dry areas.
Viewer Tip: Farmers can use various methods to reduce soil erosion in their crop fields. One of the most common, low-cost methods is conservation tillage, which leaves left-over ground cover on the field to reduce erosion. Other methods include planting cover crops that grow in late-fall to provide soil protection during the winter months, or planting rows of shrubs and trees to act as windbreaks around crop fields.

View soil erosion maps at the NRCS "State of the Land" Web site: http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/TECHNICAL/land/erosion.html

(Source: USDA Economic Research Service: Global Resources and Productivity Briefing Room, http://www.ers.usda.gov/briefing/GlobalResources/Questions/grq2.htm; US EPA, AG101: Soil Preparation, http://www.epa.gov/agriculture/ag101/cropsoil.html)