The pie chart illustrates the main causes and proportions of global land degradation, while the bar chart shows how these factors affected agricultural land in three regions of the world during the 1990s.
From an overall perspective, it is evident that overgrazing was the largest contributor to worldwide land degradation. In addition, Europe experienced the highest percentage of degraded land compared to North America and Oceania, while the leading causes varied across regions.
To begin with, the pie chart indicates that overgrazing accounted for the greatest share of global land degradation at 34%. In addition, deforestation was responsible for 30% of the total, followed closely by over-cultivation at 28%. Moreover, salinization contributed the smallest proportion, representing only 8% of worldwide land degradation.
Furthermore, the bar chart reveals that Europe was the most affected region, with a total of 23% of land degraded. Deforestation was the main cause in this region at 8.4%, however, over-cultivation and overgrazing also played significant roles, accounting for 7.7% and 5.6% respectively. North America experienced much lower degradation overall, mainly due to over-cultivation. Otherwise, Oceania showed a different pattern, where overgrazing was the dominant cause at 10.8%, while other factors remained relatively minor.