Review of Soil Degradation in the Region of Nazareno, Minas Gerais: Brazil

Gullies are usually developed by the acceleration of natural erosive processes, caused by human intervention. The Nazareno municipality, in Minas Gerais' state, Brazil, has almost a hundred gullies in its area causing damages to both the environment and the people. The region is characterized by having distinct and metamorphized geology, from the Archean, Paleoproterozoic and Proterozoic Eras. Besides, there's a faulting area with shear zones near it, and the rocks present tectonic foliation patterns (cleavage, schistosity and gneissic banding). The main soil types are Red-yellow Oxisol, Red Oxisol, Cambisol and Gleysol. The three first ones occur in the major gullies areas. The Cambisol is the most susceptible to soil erosion and an instability to its exposure is caused by human activity. These activities, such as mining, the opening of roads without an adequate drainage system, the inappropriate agricultural management and occupation of the land are accelerating gully processes; in addition, the high intensity of rainfalls also brings the destabilization of exposed areas. Many of the inadequacy on the management of degraded areas in Brazil, in this case as an example, are the difficulty of dealing with the environmental responses to land use, associated to a lack of sustainable planning of rural and urban expansion.