History and Scope
The programme in Physical Land Resources has
its roots in the former M.Sc. programmes in Soil Science, organised
by the International Training Centre for Post-Graduate Soil Scientists
(ITC-Gent), and Eremology, organised by the International Centre
for Eremology (ICE), both at the Ghent University.
The ITC-Gent has a long-standing reputation in the academic formation
and training of soil scientists in basic soil science and survey
and agricultural applications of soil science. Founded in 1963,
with support of UNESCO, in answer to a large number of requests
from abroad, the Institute has trained over 800 students from
about 90 different nations from all over the globe.
The ICE was founded in 1989, as a reaction to the disastrous droughts
Sahelian countries were suffering from since the early 1970's.
As such a special branch of science devoted to the study of desert
and semi-desert conditions, named "eremology" (from
greek "eremos", meaning : desert) was created. Since
its foundation about 70 students from 30 different countries have
graduated from the Centre.
For the new programme in Physical Land Resources, started in 1997,
an appeal was made to the Faculty of Applied Sciences at the Free
University of Brussels, to co-operate and to widen the scope of
the course with an option focusing on the non-agricultural use
and applications of physical land resources.
A country's physical land resources are a fundamental pillar of
support for human life and welfare. World wide, population pressures
and severe degradation, pollution and desertification problems
are threatening this - for several countries relatively scarce-natural
resource, and cause competition between agricultural or industrial
purposes, urban planning and nature conservation. To guarantee
a proper use and management of this for a nation basic commodity,
well trained specialists with a thorough knowledge of the properties
and characteristics of this natural resource, and a solid insight
in factors and measures that may alter its actual state and value
are warranted and call for a high standard scientific and practical
education.
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