Area (2002) 34.4, 428–437 The nature, extent and causes of land degradation in South Africa: legacy of the past, lessons for the future? M E Meadows and M T Hoffman Department of Environmental and Geographical Science and Department of Botany, University of Cape Town, Rondebosch 7701, South Africa Emails: meadows@enviro.uct.ac.za; thoffman botzoo.uct.ac.za Revised manuscript received 19 August 2002 The aim of this paper is to reassess the land degradation and desertification problem in South Africa. The country has a wide range of interrelated environmental and development challenges existing in a socio-political context recently subject to substantial change. The paper outlines the fundamental environmental constraints and opportunities that underlie degradation phenomena and illustrates the nature, extent and geographical distribution of the major forms of soil and vegetation degradation in the country. The principal causes of degradation are identified and some important land use and land tenure questions that need to be addressed in the near future are posited. Key words: South Africa, land degradation, land tenure, historical legacy, soil erosion, vegetation degradation Introduction In Nairobi, Kenya, in 1977, the United Nations Conference on Desertification highlighted the occurrence of what is arguably the first global-scale environmental problem to be recognized as such. Almost one half of the world’s land surface is classified as ‘dryland’, comprised of hyper-arid, arid, semi-arid and dry subhumid areas, and a substantial proportion of this is thought to be in various degrees of degradation. Recent global assessments (Middleton and Thomas 1997) suggest that degradation in these areas impacts on more than one billion people who are dependent on the land for their livelihoods. Indeed, up to 73 per cent of the drylands of Africa are affected by desertification (UNCED 1992). But such statistics are of little use to governments and other decision makers responsible for establishing land use policy, since what is really required is a detailed assessment of the various environmental and socio-economic issues underpinning and related to land degradation and desertification at national, regional and even local scales. The aim of this paper is to examine the land degradation and desertification problem in South Africa, a country which has a newly established democratic political order and in which there exists a wide range of interrelated environmental and devel- opment challenges. In the process, the fundamental environmental constraints and opportunities that underpin the land degradation issue in the country are explored, followed by an illustration of the nature, extent and geographical distribution of the major forms of soil and vegetation degradation ex- perienced. The principal causes of degradation in this context are then identified, followed by a con- sideration of some important land use and land tenure questions that need to be addressed in the near future. In so doing, we show how the political history of the country has influenced, and indeed continues to influence, not only land degradation itself, but also the approach towards its management. ISSN 0004-0894  Royal Geographical Society (with The Institute of British Geographers) 2002