Haiti – Dominican Republic - Disasters and Conflicts - UNEP

sediment and widens the watercourses, but alsoresults in rapid drying out of the watercoursebetween flood events.Field observations by the assessment team noticedthat the worst degradation in the Haitian borderzone is almost completely irreversible, due to anear total loss of productive topsoil across wideareas. While vegetation is still visible in such areas,the productivity of the remaining exposed subsoil isso low that agriculture would not be economicallyviable and reforestation will be difficult.Land clearing for agriculture, including the use offire (slash-and-burn) is one of the main drivers forland degradation in the border zone. On both sidesof the border, land is usually cleared by slashingand burning. Any trees that can be used as fuelor in the production of charcoal are removed andthe remaining brush and rough grasses are seton fire. The remaining ash acts as a fertilizer andgives the soil a short term fertility boost. Annualcrops are then planted in time for the rainy season.However, as most agricultural land in the borderzone is sloped, the rains rapidly remove the ashand topsoil. In addition fire usually spreads beyondthe fields targeted in the process, often resulting inuncontrollable forest fires, which further degradethe land.In the absence of soil conditioning and conservation,the depleted soils on cleared land commonlydrops in productivity after 1-3 years. 199 It is thenno longer in a state suitable to produce sufficientcrops and is commonly left uncultivated for anumber of years. In the interim the land may selfrevegetate.However, in many cases it is subjectto grazing by cattle, sheep and goats, whichsuppresses brush and tree re-growth and results inan exposed landscape of very short grasses and200, 201animal trails.Due to a shortage of land, farmers often try tostart another slash and burn cycle before sufficientvegetation cover and fertility has returned. The landis by then so degraded that it proves unproductive– a situation that has direct and obviousconsequences for food insecurity and poverty inLand degradation in general and severe erosion in particular are visible throughout the border zone, and areespecially severe on the Haitian side.© UNEP50 Haiti – Dominican Republic: Environmental challenges in the border zone