Ch.10 Agriculture

Third Agricultural Revolution

Period in which agriculture became globalized and industrialized, and new technologies increased the food supply. Occurred in the late 20th century (starting around 1928) with extensive mechanization, agro-biotech and reliance on irrigation and chemicals. Characterized by the development of agriculture as an industry with industrial methods and policies of production. Emphasis on profit replaces the emphasis on the agrarian way of life. Farms become large commercial enterprises or agribusinesses.

First Agricultural Revolution

Period marked by the development of seed agriculture and the use of animals in the farming process just 12,000 years ago in Europe and SE Asia and is characterized by the development of settlements. Farming replaced hunting and gathering; also called the Neolithic Revolution.

Fair Trade

This movement started in order to move more of the money paid for high-demand products to the laborers who make the products in LDCS (like coffee, bananas, sugar and cocoa), Prior to this movement, very little money went to the producers. Positives are that workers get higher share and it equalizes the rights of LDCS. CONS are that products are more expensive and the movement often only pushes for minimum wage, which is low in LDCs.

Thomas Malthus

A British economist that concluded that the rate of population was growing at a faster rate than agricultural productivity leading to over-population.

Import

A commodity, article, or service brought in from abroad for sale.

Export

A commodity, article, or service sold abroad.

Genetically-modified foods (GMOs)

A controversial patented technology that resulted from a revolution in biotechnology, where animals and plants are genetically engineered through the mixing of genes from different organisms. Done to make food disease resistance and more productivity. Monsanto holds the most patents.

Cash crop

A crop that t is grown for profit and to meet some luxury purpose, rather than to sustain the population. They are generally grown in the developing world and exported to the developed world. Examples include cotton, sugarcane, coffee, rubber, tobacco, cocoa, jute, bananas, tea, coconut, and palm oil.

Food crop

A crop, such as rice or wheat, that is grown for human consumption.

Feedlot

A factory like farm devoted to either livestock fattening or dairying. These have mostly replaced free-range cattle ranching in the USA.

Ridge Tillage

A system of planting crops on ridge tops, in order to reduce farm production costs and promote greater soil conservation.

Ranching

A form of commercial agriculture in which livestock graze over an extensive area.

Township and range (survey pattern)

A land survey system (way of dividing up land) typically found in the Midwest USA and Canada, created by US Land Ordinance in 1785, under the Articles of Confederation. This system established a rectangular grid pattern in order to sell and settle newly acquired federal land to pioneers in the west. Known for its rigid, square pattern, which includes roads.

Plantation

A large, frequently foreign-owned piece of agricultural land devoted to the production of a single export cash crop.

Combine

A machine (tractor) that performs reaping, threshing, and cleaning.

Reaper

A machine that cuts grain standing in a field.

Seed Drill

A machine that sowed seeds in rows and covered up the seeds in rows

Von Thunen Model

A model of concentric rings that illustrates the importance of market proximity, placing activities that require intensive cultivation and cannot be transported over great distance due to perishability, paying higher rents to be close to the market (CBD). Focuses on minimizing costs of transportation and land in order to maximize profit.

Agribusiness

A multinational agricultural corporation that dominates a significant fraction of the world's agricultural markets through their control of land, technology, machinery, shipping, packaging, and marketing. Involves the economic and political relationships which organize food production for commercial purposes, including activities ranging from seed production, to retailing, to consumption of agricultural products.

Staple grains

A principal raw material or commodity grown or produced in a region. Often cereal grains, such as corn, wheat ,and rice.

Pesticides

A substance used for destroying insects or other organisms harmful to cultivated plants or to animals. Controversial due to the negative effects they have had endangering certain animals/insects, polluting ground water and rivers through agricultural run-off, and impacting food eaten by humans. Organic Agriculture uses no pesticides.

Sawah

A terraced field deliberately flooded for growing wet rice, often found in Asia.

Pastoralism (Pastoral Nomadism)

A type of agricultural activity based on nomadic animal husbandry or the raising of livestock to provide food, clothing, and shelter.

Collective Farm

A type of agriculture where multiple farmers OR the state (communist style) run their holdings as a joint enterprise. Farmland is aggregated (or forcefully donated) to increase land available for farming. These farms are based on common ownership of resources and on pooling of labor and income, in contrast to privately-owned family farms. Many communist countries (Soviet Union, China, Vietnam) forced this style on a large scale, under state ownership, which led to widespread famine. On a smaller and voluntary scale, this style of farming is known as an agricultural cooperative (co-op) in which member-owners engage jointly in farming activities in a democratic style.

Mediterranean Agriculture

Agriculture practiced in areas with a Mediterranean climate; mostly horticulture.

Commercial agriculture

All agricultural activity generated for the purpose of selling and profit, not necessarily for local consumption.

Threshing

Separating grain from (a plant), typically with a flail or by the action of a revolving mechanism.

Extensive Agriculture

An agricultural system that involves large areas of land, characterized by low labor per unit of land area. Includes commercial agriculture as well as certain kinds of subsistence agriculture, such as shifting cultivation and pastoral nomadism.

Metes and bounds (survey pattern)

An older land survey system (way of dividing up land) typically found in the eastern USA and in England that uses natural features (lakes, rivers, trees) to make borders between tracts of land. Uses physical features of the local geography, along with directions and distances, to define and describe the boundaries of a parcel of land.

Hunting & gathering

Before the invention of agriculture, humans obtained the food they needed for survival. They lived in small groups. The men hunted game or fished, and the women collected berries, nuts, and roots. The groups traveled frequently, establishing new home bases or camps. The direction and frequency of migration depended on the movement of game and the seasonal growth of plants.

Intensive subsistence agriculture

Cultivating a small amount of land very efficiently to produce food for the farmer's family. Involves the effective and efficient use of human labor and fertilizer to maximize crop yield in densely populated areas, such as China, India and SE Asia. Wet Rice, cultivated on terraced fields, is common.

Seed agriculture

Developed later than vegetative planting, this type of farming involves planting seeds rather than simply planting part of the parent plant.

Capital-Intensive Agriculture

Farming that requires a large amount of capital (money) investment to purchase machine (tractors) to produce large amounts of agricultural goods. Commercial Farming is an example.

Paddy

Inaccurate name given by Europeans and North Americans to the flooded field where wet rice is planted, known as a sawah. This is the Malay word for wet rice.

Swidden

Land that is prepared for agriculture by using the slash-and-burn method.

Truck Farming (Market gardening)

Name given to commercial/market gardens that practice horticulture. Named after the Middle English word for bartering.

Organic Agriculture

Plants grown without green technology.

Livestock ranching

Practice of mixing many types of seeds on the same plot of land. Done in Subsistence Agriculture.

Vegetative planting

Process of cultivating by simply cutting off a stem of another plant or by dividing roots of a plant.

Milkshed

Ring surrounding a city from which milk can be supplied without spoiling.

Slash-and-burn agriculture

System of cultivation that usually exists in tropical areas where vegetation is cut close to the ground and then ignited to release nutrients..

Fallow

Term to describe uncropped land. This occurs When farmers practice crop rotation or shifting agriculture and do not plant crops in a specific field in order to allow the nutrients in the soil to be restored.

Sustainable Agriculture

Term used to describe agricultural practices that preserve and enhance the environment for future generations.

Agriculture

The art and science of producing food from the land and tending livestock for the purpose of human consumption.

Deforestation

The destruction of forests, often by Slash and Burn Farming in rainforest regions (Amazon in Brazil, Nepal, Malaysia, Congo in W. Africa)

Environmental Degradation

The deterioration of the environment through depletion of resources such as air, water and soil; the destruction of ecosystems; habitat destruction; the extinction of wildlife; and pollution.

Horticulture

The growing of fruits, vegetables, and flowers.

Green Revolution

The development of higher-yield and fast-growing crops in the 1970s and 1980s through increased technology, pesticides, and fertilizers transferred from the developed to developing world to alleviate the problem of food supply in those regions of the globe.

Second Agricultural Revolution

The development of improved sanitation, storage, fertilization techniques, and farming innovations (crop rotation, steel plow) allowed for greater food output; coincided with the Industrial Revolution in England and a higher population growth rate. Peaked at around 1650 AD. This was the rise of commercial agriculture.

Colombian Exchange

The exchange of plants, animals, diseases, and technologies between the Americas (New World) and the rest of the Old World following Columbus's voyages.

Double cropping

The growing of two crops per year in a single field to double agricultural output. Used especially in Asia as part of intensive subsistence agriculture. In China and India, during the drier winters they will grow wheat and in the wetter summers they will grow rice.

The Boserup Thesis

The idea that subsistence farmers increase the supply of food through intensification of production. Argues that Food supply is dependent on human innovation.

Enclosure Movement

The legal process in England during the 18th -19th centuries of enclosing (fencing off) a number of small landholdings and common lands to create one larger farm, owned by a wealthy farmer. Once enclosed, use of the land became restricted to the owner, and it ceased to be common land for communal use. Smaller farmers were forced off the land and moved to the cities to work in the emerging factories, providing the labor that give way to the Industrial Revolution in England. Meanwhile, wealthier farmers now with larger landholdings had the means to adopt better farming practices that made farming more productive, leading to the second agricultural revolution.

Transhumance

The movements of livestock according to seasonal patterns; generally lowland areas in the winter, and highland areas in the summer.

Crop rotation

The planting of different crops each year to replenish the soil's nutrients that were lost to a previous crop. The Four-field system is now used in most MDCS (Replaced 2 and 3 Field Systems) EX: Root Crop (Turnips) - used for animals, Field B: Cereal Grain (Barley) - sold to make beer, Field C: Rest Crop (Clover) - used for cattle grazing and nitrogen restoration of the soil, Field D: Cereal Grain (Wheat) - heads of wheat threshed (beaten) and sold for flour production, straw (stalk of wheat) used for animal stalls.

Intertillage

The planting of different crops together in the same field, a method often used by subsistence farmers. Benefits include spreading out food production over the growing season, reducing disease and pest loss, protection from loss of soil moisture, erosion control.

Terrace Farming

The practice of cutting flat areas (steps) out of a hilly or mountainous landscape in order to grow crops and prevent erosion and soil runoff and irrigate crops. Used in most mountainous areas, from the rice fields of Asia, to vineyards in Italy, to coffee plantations on the steep slopes of the Andes in South America.

Globalization

The process by which businesses or other organizations develop international influence or start operating on an international scale. Results in a more uniform landscape.

Desertification

The process by which formerly fertile lands become increasingly arid, unproductive, and desert-like.

Mechanization

The process of changing from working largely or exclusively by hand or with animals to doing that work with machinery.

Commodity Chain

The process used by firms to gather resources, transform them into goods or commodities, and finally, distribute them to consumers. It is the network of labor and production processes whose end result is a finished commodity (product). Each step is known as a "link" in the chain.

Subsistence agriculture

The providing of food for direct consumption by the farmer and farmer's family. Usually performed in LDCs

Gross Domestic Product (GDP)

The total value of goods produced and services provided in a country during one year. How much money the country makes in one year.

Shifting cultivation

The use of tropical forest clearings for crop production until their fertility is lost. Plots are then abandoned, and farmers move on to new sites. Land is cleared through slash-and-burn farming.

Biodiversity

The variety of life in the world or in a particular habitat or ecosystem.

Pampas

The vast grassy plains of northern Argentina where Gaucho cowboys ranch cattle.

Wallerstein's World Systems Theory

Theory developed by Immanuel Wallerstein that explains the emergence of a core, periphery, semi-periphery in terms of economic and political connections. These connections were first established at the beginning of exploration in the late 15th century and maintained through increased economic access through the present. Core: Countries with strong economies with large economic productivity, high per capita GDP. Seen as the MDCs of the world Semi-periphery: The newly industrialized countries with median standards of living, such as Chile, Brazil, India, China and Indonesia. They offer their citizens relatively diverse economic opportunities but also have extreme gaps between rich and poor. Periphery: Countries that have low levels of economic productivity, low per capita incomes and generally low standards of living. The world economic periphery includes Africa (not S. Africa), parts of S. America and Asia. The LDCs of the world.

Domestication

To convert animals and plants to domestic use.