Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) and aerial photos were used to assess soil erosion on the western slopes of the Uluguru Mountains in Tanzania. Aerial photos were interpreted using mirror stereoscopes for the classification and production of a land cover map of the sample area. Several attributes were used to categorise the extent of erosion in different land cover classes. These included area under cultivation, slope gradient and presence of erosion features like bare soil, exposed roots of trees and grass tuffs.