The badlands of Italy: a vanishing landscape?

The Italian badlands, epitomized by calanchi and biancane, are being reclaimed for agriculture, a process driven by historic agricultural reforms and the European Union Common Agricultural Policy. In certain regions this has occurred to such an extent that they are no longer perceived as inhospitable environments but of intrinsic value to the cultural heritage. Soil analysis indicates high exchangeable sodium percentages and organic matter contents below 2 per cent, resulting in an unstable dispersive clay onto which badlands tend to re-establish. This leads to potentially high rates of erosion following reclamation. By establishing the stability threshold, the potential for reversing reclamation can be assessed and the extent to which badlands are vanishing may be determined, (C) 1998 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.