What is a plateau?

The meaning of a plateau

A plateau is a landform that rises up from the land around it and has a more or less flat surface. Some of its sides are often steep slopes. Think of it as a raised table of land. Like mountains, plateaus can be young or old in the Earth’s history, and their height can vary from a few hundred metres to several thousand metres.

Plateau, mountain or plain?

	Mountain	Plateau	Plain
Top	Narrow summit	More or less flat	Flat or gently rolling
Sides	Steep slopes	Steep on some sides	No large hills or deep valleys
Height	Much higher than surroundings	A few hundred to several thousand metres	Generally under 300 m

Two famous plateaus

• The Tibetan Plateau is the largest and highest plateau in the world. Its average altitude is about 4,500 m, which is why it is nicknamed the ‘Roof of the World’. From east to west it is nearly 2,500 km long, about the distance from Chandigarh to Kanyakumari.
• The Deccan Plateau of central and south India is one of the oldest plateaus in the world. It was formed through volcanic activity millions of years ago.

Storehouses of minerals

Like mountains, plateaus are rich in mineral deposits, so they have been called ‘storehouses of minerals’. Mining is a major activity on plateaus, and many of the world’s largest mines are found there.

• The East African Plateau is famous for gold and diamond mining.
• In India, the Chhota Nagpur Plateau has huge reserves of iron, coal and manganese.

These minerals are used to make steel, run power stations and build machines, so plateau regions are important for industry. Mining also brings challenges, such as cleared forests and damaged land, which need careful handling.

Soils and farming

The plateau environment varies a lot across the world. Many plateaus have rocky soil, which is less fertile than the soil of plains, so they are less favourable for farming. The exception is lava plateaus, formed by volcanic activity, which often have rich black soil. Parts of the Deccan Plateau have such black soil, which holds moisture well.

Waterfalls

Rivers flowing over the edges of plateaus create many spectacular waterfalls.

• Victoria Falls on the Zambezi River in southern Africa.
• Hundru Falls on the Subarnarekha River in the Chhota Nagpur Plateau.
• Jog Falls on the Sharavati River in the Western Ghats.
• Nohkalikai Falls, which drop 340 m from the Cherrapunji Plateau in Meghalaya.

Extra: the other heights in the chart are approximate figures from common sources, given only to compare.

Plateaus on the journey

At the start of the chapter, a road trip begins in the Chhota Nagpur region of Jharkhand. There you would see a plateau landscape: rolling uplands with rocky soil, forests, mines of coal and iron, and waterfalls such as Hundru. As the road descends to Prayagraj, the land becomes a flat, fertile plain.

For the other landforms, read mountains and life in the mountains and what are plains. For the textbook’s questions, see the Chapter 3 NCERT solutions; for the whole chapter, see the Chapter 3 notes.