Contenu du sommaire

Soil erosion in Lesotho. In Africa , Lesotho is the country that suffers the most from soil erosion. This erosion is so serious that it is feared the dams that the Union of South Africa has built along the Orange River will soon be silted. Within this land-locked kingdom, erosion is mostly active in the Lowlands, where the majority of the population is located and which is on the increase. The possibility of finding work easily in the South African mines has until now obscured this environmental problem. However, if the country one day is unable to offer alternative job opportunities, its economic future will be seriously compromised.

A Demographic and Social Specificity in China. The retrocession of Hong Kong to China has created a multiple number of challenges as regards the management of a social-demographic situation that is radically different from that existing in the People 's Republic of the mother country. The maintenance of a sustained demogra¬ phic growth, due mainly to immigration should hardly be taken for granted , all the more since the urban area is now saturated. Hong Kong has become similar to the West in terms of employment and society patterns, and therefore far different from the mainland of China. The tasks with which it is confronted will be delicate not only for the local authorities but also -in spite of the fiction of a certain autonomy -for those of the People 's Republic.

Changes in the Agricultural and Forest Territories of Thailand : a Cartographic Interpretation. Over the past fifty years, the Southeast Asian countryside have been transformed radically. Expansion of cultivated land, mainly at the expense of the forests, constitutes the most obvious change that has occured. In Thailand, this process was particularly rapid. The present article aims both to study the cartogra¬ phical work already available, and to offer some original analytical information that may contribute to the understanding of the process.

Cachment areas and Hydrographie Networks in The Three Main Islands. Mahe, Praslin, La Digue -of the Seychelles Archipelago, Indian Ocean. The hydrographie network of the three main granitic islands of Seychelles (Mahe, Praslin, La Digue) has never been studied. The catchment areas are often lower than 5 km2 because the islands are small (respectively 154, 37 and 10 km2) and mountainous. Rivers are less than 5 km long and they have important slopes (between 15 and 25%). In Mahe island there are three hydrological areas. The most important point discharge are 200 to 500 l/s, and specific yield is 50 to 60 l/s/km2.

Between Plateau and Medina : A Program of Urban development in Dakar, Senegal. A partnership is recognized as being one of the most important means that can be adopted in order to accede to a lasting form of urban development. The municipal facilities offer it a new field of expression due to the expansion of this market and its tendancy towards liberalization. The example of the development of the fallow field left in the center of Dakar by the former Petersen oil works points out both the extent and the limitations of a joint part er ship formed round the State or other collective entities, wich were created by the closure of the oil works.