Cane Lands Erosion

rpHE most extensive soil deterioration X has, however, taken place in the dry zone where the principal Indian farm ing settlements are centred around the cane lands. The Colonial Sugar Refining Com pany Limited has, for many years, followed an enlightened policy of insist ing on the maintenance of soil fertility through the compulsory inclusion of a green manure crop in the rotation and the application of coral sand, super phosphate and potash to the cane. On the poorer red tuff soils applications of mill mud, rice hulls and coral sand have raised the fertility level over a relatively shbrt period. The principal cane lands are alluvial flats and gently undulating slopes but even on the latter the main tenance of a high level of fertility, coupled with the nature of the crop, has limited soil wash to a minimum.

On the periphery of the cane settle ments, the foothills and small valleys are closely settled by Indian farmers who plant both swamp and hill rice and a

variety of other crops. These farms, which are worked as family holdings varying in size but averaging about fif teen acres, are intensively cultivated and the use of the plough is universal. Man uring is not practised, though livestock are kept, and no attempt is made either to maintain fertility or to prevent soil wash. All of these farmers keep work ing bullocks and one or two milch cows and many keep goats also; these and the livestock of the cane farmers within the settlement, where there is little grazing land other than field headlands and the roadside, are depastured on the hills within and around the fringe of the settle ments. In the dry season these hills pre sent a sorry picture: red gashes show up where the vegetal cover has disappeared entirely, but over most of the hills the cover has degenerated and shrubby weeds and coarse unpalatable grasses are be coming dominant. An accessory factor giving rise to gullying is the common use of the gazeta, a rough bullock sledge hewn

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from a tree fork, which is used for the transport of produce to the road.

IT is in these areas that the principal effort is being made to establish con trol and to arrest the further de gradation of the land.

After the 1938 survey the first steps were taken to prepare for a campaign but at this stage the war intervened and for the period of its duration the re sources of the Department of Agriculture had to be diverted to the increased pro duction of food crops. Since that time the effort has been increased and. in addition to the conventional methods of control of movement of surplus water on farming land, particular attention is being given to the selection and trial of pasture grasses, fodder crops and legumes, since it is fundamental that in the closely settled areas the livestock population pressure on rough grazing areas must be relieved by the supplementary use of fod der crops as well as by increasing the carrying capacity of pastures with better grasses and rotational grazing.

Efforts to raise the fertility of arable lands by the conservation and use of farmyard manure have met with much less encouraging response. All Indian farmers keep livestock but these are not housed at any time; demonstration stock sheds for the conservation of manure have evoked little interest and it is evi dent that some means of returning fer tility to the land which entails less expenditure of labour must be devised.

Demonstrations of contour lay-out have been established in a number of districts.

In the earlier demonstrations it was ne cessary for Government to undertake the complete work of throwing up the bunds, but the idea has caught on well with Indian farmers and in one district, where erosion is most in evidence, there is a waiting list of farmers who only require the contour lines to be staked out, after

which the farmer himself ploughs out and consolidates the bunds and digs whatever drains are necessary. Outfalls from the drains lead to natural water courses wherever possible but shallow, grassed outlets have also been constructed. Simple furrow lines the contour have also been put in on some grazing areas to observe the effect on the re-establishment of grasses.

This work has hitherto been undertaken by the extension staff as part of their normal duties. In 1948 Legislative Coun cil approved the appointment of a Soil Conservation Officer and an Assistant to gether with the provision of grading and terracing equipment; it is expected that with these facilities the work will be pushed ahead more rapidly.

It is found in practice that the form of land tenure is a dominating factor in de termining the attitude of the farmer to the adoption of soil conservation practice.

Roughly 400,000 acres of the Colony’s agricultural land is held under fee simple and another 400,000 acres under lease from the Native Lands Trust Board (prin cipally) and the Crown. Farming in the closely settled areas is for the most part undertaken by Indian tenant farmers; where these farmers hold annual or other short term tenancies from private land lords the type of farming practised is exploitation of the worst kind, and in the absence of provision for compensa tion for improvements or dilapidations no better can be expected. ‘The Native Lands Trust Board and the Crown, as landlords, have a forward policy in en couraging tenants by the grant of thirty year leases with renewals to be decided fifteen years in advance of the expiry of the lease and with provision for compen sation for improvements if the lease is not renewed.

There is no legislation providing for the conservation of soil and water resources

so that there is at present no means of prompting the conscience of short-sighted or irresponsible landlords; without such legislation the full implementation of a soil conservation policy is impracticable.

Dr. William Armstrong, superintendent of Tanna Presbyterian hospital, New Hebrides, is in Victoria on furlough. Sister Nancy Parkinson, also of the New Hebrides, has arrived in Melbourne on furlough.