Unit 5 Review Agriculture
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
UNIT 5 REVIEW AGRICULTURE Agriculture = deliberate modification of Earth’s surface through cultivation of plants and rearing of animals to obtain sustenance or economic gain Origins of Agriculture Vegetative Planting Seed Agriculture reproduction of plants by direct cloning Definition reproduction of plants through annual from existing plants, such as cutting planting of seeds that result from sexual stems and dividing roots fertilization • Southeast Asia (taro, yam, banana) Origin • Western India (wheat, barley) • West Africa (oil palm tree, yam) • Northern China (millet, rice) • NW South America (sweet potato, • Ethiopia (millet, sorghum) arrow root) • Southern Mexico (squash, maize) • Northern Peru (squash, beans, cotton) Carl Sauer, a cultural geographer, believed that the earliest form of plant cultivation was vegetative planting. Subsistence Farming Commercial Farming Definition production of food primarily for consumption the production of food primarily for sale off the by the farmer’s family farm Purpose of Farming produce food for their own consumption farmers grow crops and raise animals primarily for sale off the farm rather than for their own consumption. Agricultural products are not sold directly to consumers but to food- processing companies Percentage of Farmers in Labor Force More than half of the workers are engaged in less than one-tenth of the workers are engaged farming directly in farming. The percentage of farmers is even lower in the US and Canada, at only 2% Use of Machinery Rely on people or animals, do much of the Rely on machinery to perform work. Use work with hand tools and animal power scientific advances to increase productivity Farm Size Small farms Large farms. US farms average 444 acres Increasingly dominated by a handful of large farms Relationship to other businesses Isolated business, occasional surplus sold Closely tied to other businesses Agribusiness: integrated into a large food- production industry Events in the History of Agriculture Event Description/Impact First Agricultural Revolution ! When man first went from hunting and gathering to the Neolithic Revolution domestication of plants and animals. Second Agricultural Revolution ! the unprecedented increase in agricultural production in Britain between the mid-17th and late 19th centuries ! linked to such new agricultural practices as crop rotation, selective breeding, and a more productive use of arable land. ! Agricultural output grew faster than the population over the century to 1770 and thereafter productivity remained among the highest in the world. ! cause of the industrial Revolution Columbian Exchange ! the widespread transfer of plants, animals, culture, human populations, technology, diseases, and ideas between the Americas, West Africa, and the Old World in the 15th and 16th centuries. Third Agricultural Revolution ! a set of research technology transfer initiatives occurring Green Revolution between 1950 and the late 1960s, that increased agricultural production worldwide, particularly in the developing world, beginning most markedly in the late 1960s. ! The initiatives resulted in the adoption of new technologies, including high-yielding varieties (HYVs) of cereals, especially dwarf wheats and rices, in association with chemical fertilizers and agro-chemicals, and with controlled water-supply (usually involving irrigation) and new methods of cultivation, including mechanization. ! Leader Norman Borlaug Fourth Agricultural Revolution ! New trends in engineering, digital agriculture with a greater focus on protecting the environment ! A movement in which food is both grown and sold locally, and fertilizers and pesticides are minimized or eliminated in favor of pure organic farming. ! Organic Farming, Sustainable farming ! Agriculture Types in LDCs Type Characteristics Climate Other Info o Humid, low-latitude o Occupies ¼ of o Farmers clear land for planting by o High temps, world’s land area slashing vegetation and burning the abundant rainfall o Less than 5% of Shifting debris (slash and burn) world’s people Cultivation o Farmers grow crops on a cleared engaged field for only a few years until soil o Declining – not Region/Countries nutrients are depleted then leave it efficient fallow (nothing planted) for many o Amazon area of o Environmentally years so the soil can recover South America, sound o Cleared area = swidden Central and West Africa, and Southeast Asia Type Characteristics Climate Other Info o Based on herding of domesticated o Arid, semi-arid o Transhumance: animals where planting crops seasonal migration of o Rely on animals rather than crops is impossible livestock Pastoral o Camel, sheet, goats, horse o Declining because of Nomadism Region/Countries technology and conflict with o North Africa, Middle governments East, parts of Central Asia o Example: Bedouins of Saudi Arabia Type Characteristics Region/Countries Other Info o Farmers expend large effort to o Wet-rice dominant = o Sawah = a flooded product the maximum yield from a SE China, East India, field for growing rice parcel of land SE Asia o Double cropping = Intensive o In areas of high density o Wet-rice not harvesting twice a Subsistence o Waste virtually no land dominant = interior year from same field India, NE China o Crop rotation = rotate crops to avoid exhausting soil Type Characteristics Climate Other Info o large farm that specializes in one to o Tropics and o Sparely populated two crops subtropics areas o Cotton, sugar, rubber, tobacco o Was popular in US Plantation o Cocoa, coffee, jute, bananas, tea, o Demand for cotton coconuts, palm oil Region/Countries o Latin America, Africa, Asia Agricultural Types in MDCs Type Description Location Other Info Mixed ! Integration of crops and ! Corn Belt = most important • Permits farmers to Crop & livestock mixed crop and livestock distribute the Livestock ! Most of the crops are fed to farming region in the US workload evenly animals rather that ! Extends from Ohio to the throughout year consumed directly by Dakotas, with its center in • In US, corn is chosen humans Iowa most frequently ! Typical farm = devotes o Some nearly all land area to consumed growing crops but derives directly more than ¾ of its income o Most used to from the sale of animal feed pigs and products (beef, milk, eggs) cattle • Soybeans second Dairy ! Dairying is the most • farms near the large urban ! Choice of product Farming important type of areas of the Northeast US, varies within the US commercial agriculture in Southeast Canada, and dairy region the first ring outside large Northwest Europe ! Dairy farming requires cities because of ! Improvements in constant attention transportation factors. transportation have throughout the year permitted dairying to be ! Expense of feeding undertaken farther from the cows in winter market ! Largest milk producers = (1) India (2) United States. Pakistan and China are set to pass Russia as third and fourth largest Grain ! Grain = seed from various ! North American prairies ! Ability to provide Farming grasses, like wheat, corn, labeled the world’s food for many people oats, barley, rice, millet, and “breadbasket.” in the world is a others. ! Ability to provide food for source of economic ! Crops on a grain farm are many people in the world and political strength grown primarily for is a source of economic for US and Canada consumption by humans and political strength for rather than by livestock US and Canada ! Commercial grain farms sell ! US by far largest their output to commercial producer of manufacturers of food grain products, such as breakfast ! Winter wheat belt = cereals and snack-food Kansas, Colorado, makers Oklahoma ! Most important crop grown ! Spring-wheat belt= is wheat: used to make Dakotas, Montana, bread flour southern Saskatchewan in Canada Livestock ! Ranching: commercial ! Semi-arid or arid land Farming grazing of livestock over an where vegetation too extensive area. sparse ! Latin America Mediterran ! Most crops grown in the ! Lands that border the ! Most of the world’s ean Mediterranean lands are Mediterranean Sea in olives, grapes, fruits Agriculture grown for human Southern Europe, North and vegetables are consumption rather than for Africa, Western Asia. grown in animal feed ! Farmers in California, Mediterranean ! Horticulture – growing of central Chile, SW part of agriculture areas fruits, vegetables, and South Africa, and SW flowers – and tree crops Australia form the commercial base ! Sea winds provide of Mediterranean farming moisture and moderate the winter temperatures. ! Summers and are hot and dry but sea breezes provide some relief Commercia ! Truck farming = bartering ! Predominant in the US ! Highly efficient large- l Gardening or the exchange of Southeast scale operations & Fruit commodities ! Long growing season and ! Migrant workers and Farming ! Truck farms grow many of humid climate and is experimentation with the fruits and vegetables accessible to the large techniques keep prices that consumers demand in markets of NY, low the more developed Philadelphia, Washington societies. and other US urban areas. VON THUNEN MODEL Describe the Von Thunen Model. What happens at each ring? Generally, farms located close to the market select crops with higher transportation costs, whereas distant markets are more likely to select crops that can be transported less expensively ! Model shows that a commercial farmer must combine two sets of monetary values to determine the most profitable crop: o The value of the yield per hectare o The cost