Zschortau, near Leipzig is to many people an unlikely place to be associated with global plans to address land degradation problems. Nevertheless as a result of a meeting at the centre of the Deutsche Stiftung fur Internationale Entwicklung (DSE) in September 1994, the Zschortau plan for the implementation of soil, water, and nutrient management research is widely known in international agricultural research circles. The Zschortau plan recommended major changes in the level, organization and nature of land management research. These changes were based on the latest thinking by a group of 47 soil scientists, economists, sociologists and farmers who attended the Zschortau meeting. The need for change was clear from the evidence presented that land degradation through erosion, salinization, acidification, nutrient decline and other processes was continuing virtually unabated in the Tropics, despite sizable investments in research and the development of technologies to combat land degradation.
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