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The Western Cape Province of South Africa has a long history of human occupation and utilisation; the impact of colonial settlement (late 17th century onwards) on agriculture has been especially prominent. The Mediterranean-type climate of the Western Cape results in landscapes which are potentially susceptible to land degradation, perhaps even desertification. The Swartland is a gently undulating inland plateau underlain largely by fine-grained and nutrient-rich shales of the pre-Cambrian Malmesbury group. Agriculture is the dominant land use to the extent of wholesale landscape transformation. The area has been subject to significant levels of land degradation in the past, manifesting itself as widespread gully erosion. During the 1940s, the region was described as on the verge of economic collapse due to the severity of soil erosion, but concerted soil conservation and education efforts under the political dispensation of the time appear to have averted that scenario. The region now faces the combined challenges of potentially rapid climate change under a considerably altered socio-economic and political order. Downscaled climate change scenarios facilitate a regional assessment of changes in the parameters affecting soil erosion susceptibility in the Swartland and leads to a consideration of the implications of such scenarios for the continuation of contemporary land use practices. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.