Pasture degradation has been a great problem for Brazilian livestock breeding, developed basically from grassland. It is estimated that 80% out of the 50 to 60 million hectares of grassland grown in Central Brazil lie in some degradation status, namely, in a evolutive process of vigor loss, with no possibility of natural recovery and incapable of supporting yield and quality demanded by the animals as well as of overcoming the harmful effects of pest insects, diseases and weeds. That degradation is a consequence of a number of factors, which act singly or jointly, such as incorrect soil tillage, wrong choice of the forage species, use of low quality seeds and poor initial establishment, inadequate management and chiefly due to the non-replacement of the nutrients lost in the productive process by export into the animals' body, erosion, leaching and volatilization along the years. The persistence of these processes peaks with degradation of soil and of the natural resources with irrecoverable damages to all the society.
Pastures; degradation; forage culture
