Bad agricultural practices

 The impact of chitemene system to our environment

Forests and woodlands are threatened with exitinction due to bad agricultural practices like chitemene system.

Chitemene (also spelled citemene), from the ciBemba word meaning “place where branches have been cut for a garden”, is a system of slash and burn agriculture practiced throughout northern Zambia. It involves

 coppicing or pollarding of standing trees in a primary or secondary growth Miombo woodland, stacking of the cut biomass, and eventual burning of the cut biomass in order to create a thicker layer of ash than would be possible with in situ burning. Crops such as maize, finger millet, sorghum, or cassava are then planted in the burned area(Wikipedia).

This practice has resulted into a serious deforestation, desertification and lower rainfall records.