Anthropogenic landscapes

Anthropogenic impact is the effect of human economic activity on geosystems. Geosystems changed by it are called anthropogenic landscapes; in fact people do not create a whole landscape, they only change some of its features. F. N. Milkov divides them into eight classes: agricultural, industrial, linear-road, forest, water, recreational, settlement (cities and villages) and belligerent landscapes. A. G. Isachenko instead distinguishes four groups by degree of change: conditionally unchanged, weakly changed, strongly changed (disturbed) and cultural landscapes. A cultural landscape is changed scientifically and sensibly, giving a comfortable environment for people and high productivity; the oases of Uzbekistan are an example. Disturbed land includes quarries, spoil heaps, landfills and gullies that have lost economic value; restoring it needs a lot of money. A geotechnical system is one whose natural and technical parts are tightly linked: a reservoir, a large canal, an irrigated field, or a factory together with the surrounding landscape.