Home > Encyclopedia of Science > Slash-and-Burn Agriculture

• Failures of slash-and-burn agriculture
• Other environmental risks of tropical deforestation

Slash-and-burn agriculture refers to the process of cutting down a forest, burning the trees, and then using the cleared land to grow crops. This agricultural approach—used mainly in tropical countries—is the leading cause of tropical deforestation.

Usually, some type of slash-and-burn system is used when vast areas of tropical rain forest are converted into large-scale, industrial farms. However, slash-and-burn is more often used by individual, poor farmers who migrate to the forest frontier in search of land on which to grow food. Poor farmers operate on a smaller scale, but since there are many such people, huge areas are ultimately affected. Slash-and-burn is an often permanent conversion of the...