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CURRENT ISSUES IN LAND RESOURCES OF THE KARAK PLATEAU
A major land resource issue is the amount of erosion occurring on landscapes in the region. Erosion is not a new problem in the region, as many landscapes show the impact of centuries of agricultural tillage and removal of the natural vegetation, whether forest or grasslands. Erosion is a major problem because of the many steep slopes and also the loess is highly erodible. Although wind erosion is more noticeable, water erosion is probably of equal or greater importance. Wind erosion is not as serious on silty soil because of the high threshold wind velocity needed to initiate erosion, as contrasted to sandy soils.
 The region south of al-Karak (Unit 7), for example, shows many eroded areas where bedrock outcrops may occur on 40% of the landscapes [Figure 6  ]. Once the
loess is removed, the soil formed on the limestone is usually
very shallow and thus agriculture is no longer viable. Another
major area of eroded landscapes is northeast of al-Karak near the city of Adir. This region has a shallow loess cap over calcrete or petrocalcic horizon. The calcrete horizon is cemented by calcium carbonate (lime) and is similar in hardness to bedrock and will not support plants. Calcrete horizons occur in other areas of the plateau; where the loess soil overlying this horizon is removed by erosion, agriculture is not feasible.
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