Class 10 Geography


Resources and Development: Resource Planning & Land Development

The process of resource planning involves following:

Land Resources

Land is one of the most important natural resources. Land supports our life system. Thus, careful planning of use of land resource is necessary. India comprises of many types of land. These are mountains, plateau, plains and islands.

pie chart land types in India

Mountains

About 30% of land area in India is in the form of mountain. Mountain supports the perennial flow of rivers, which carry fertile soils, facilitate irrigation and provide drinking water. Mountains are good avenues for tourism and adventure sports and can help in revenue generation.

Plains

About 43% of land area in India is in the form of plains. Plains provide facilities for agriculture, building of industries and houses, etc.

Plateau

About 27% of land in India is in the form of plateau which provides many types of minerals, fossil fuels and forest.

Land Utilization

pie chart land usage in India

Patterns of use of Land Resources

  1. Forests
  2. Land not available for cultivation: There are two types of land which are not used for agriculture purpose. These are:
    1. Barren and waste land
    2. Lands used for buildings, roads, factories, etc. i.e for non-agriculture purpose.
  3. Other uncultivated land (excluding fallow land)
    1. Permanent pastures and grazing land,
    2. Land under miscellaneous tree crops groves (not included in net sown area),
    3. Culturable waste land (left uncultivated for more than 5 agricultural years).
  4. Fallow lands
    1. Current fallow-(left without cultivation for one or less than one agricultural year),
    2. Other than current fallow-(left uncultivated for the past 1 to 5 agricultural years).
  5. Net sown area: Area which is sown at least once in a year is called net sown area.
  6. Gross cropped area: Area sown more than once in an agricultural year plus net sown area is known as gross cropped area.

Land Use Pattern in India:

Land Degradation

degraded land in India

This pie chart shows the area of degraded land (130 million hectare). Out of this, 56% is degraded by water and 28% if forest degraded area. Some of the major causes of land degradation are: overgrazing, mining, deforestation, division of land in small plots because of family feuds, etc.

Measures to Conserve the Land Resources:

Degradation of land can be prevented by taking following measures: