Chapter 9: Food and Agriculture

average Calories a person needs to survive

1,844 kcal

Four Agricultural Hearths

1. East Asia: rice and millet. 2. Central and South Asia: chickens and horses. 3. Sub-Saharan Africa: sorghum, yams, millet, and rice. 4. Latin America: beans, cotton, and potatoes. p 309

In 2010, what percent of farmland was devoted to GMO seeds?

10%

How many fishing regions are world's oceans divided into?

18

GMOs in America's Processed Foods

3/4 of the processed food that Americans consume has at least one genetically modified ingredient. North America was responsible for 1/2 of the world's genetically modified food. In the US, 94% of soybeans, 90% of cotton, and 88% of maize are genetically modified. p 338

1 avocado uses how many gallons of water?

40 gallons

What percentage of people are farmers in LDC's?

42%. p 310

What percentage of of the world's farmers are in LDC's?

97%. (I could not find this in the textbook and searched google so this may not be entirely reliable)

Von Thunen Model

A commercial farmer initially considers which crops to cultivate and which animals to raise based on market location by comparing two costs: the cost of land and the cost of transporting products to market. In the first ring are market-oriented gardens (horticulture) and milk producers; they are closest to the city since they are expensive to deliver and are perishable. The second ring contains wood lots for timber; it is close to the market since it is heavy. The third ring is used for crops and pasture. The fourth ring is for animal grazing since it requires a lot of land. p 329

Dairy Farming

A farm that specializes in the production of milk and other dairy products. Farms located farther from consumers are more likely to sell their output to processors that make milk products that will keep fresh for longer. Today, more the world's dairy farming is conducted in developing countries, although that was not the case in the past. p 330

What is a sawah

A flooded field for wet-rice

Pastoral Nomadism

A form of subsistence agriculture based on the herding of domesticated animals in dry climates where planting crops is impossible. The main animals selected are camels, goats, and sheep. It is a declining form of agriculture since they are no longer needed as carriers of goods and information across the deserted drylands due to modern technology; governments want the land for other uses. p 318

Intensive Subsistence Agriculture

A form of subsistence agriculture where farmers must work intensively to subsist on a parcel of land. It feeds most of the people living in developing countries. Usually, farms are on the smaller side and fragmented or shaped irregularly so that no land is wasted. The agricultural density is high (there are many farmers to the amount of arable land), so families must produce enough food for themselves on a small plot of land. p 322

Cereal Grain (Cereal)

A grass that yields grain for food. p 312

Plantation

A large farm in tropical and subtropical climates that specializes in the production of one or two crops for sale, usually to a more developed country. They are generally situated in developing countries, although they are often owned by Europeans or North Americans. Crops grown include cotton, sugarcane, coffee, rubber, tobacco, cocoa, jute, bananas, tea, coconuts, and palm oil. p 321

Transhumance

A type of pastoral nomadism that is specifically the seasonal migration of livestock between mountains and lowland pasture areas. p 319

Sustainable Agriculture (Organic Farming)

An agricultural practice that preserves and enhances environmental quality, similar to mixed crop and livestock farming since growing crops and raising livestock are integrated as much as possible. Crops are grown without application of herbicides and pesticides to control weeds, and GMO seeds are not used. Animals consume crops grown on the farm and are not confined to small pens; antibiotics are only used for therapeutic purposes. pp 344

Truck Farming

Another name for commercial gardening and fruit farming. Farms grow many of the fruits and vegetables that consumers in developing countries demand, although only some of these are sold fresh as most are sold to large processors for canning or freezing; they tend to specialize in a few crops. It is a predominant type of agriculture in the southeastern US, and a form of it called specialty farming has spread to New England. p 327

Slash-and-Burn Agriculture

Another name for shifting cultivation since farmers slash vegetation and burn debris. p 320

Crop

Any plant gathered from a field as a harvest during a particular season. p 308

Five most pesticide ridden fruits?

Apples, peaches, nectarines, strawberries, grapes

Shifting cultivation occupies how much of the world's land area?

Approximately 1/4 of the world's land area, a higher percentage than any other type of agriculture. p 321

Southwest Asia Hearth

Around 10,000 years ago, barley, wheat, lentils, and olives were domesticated. Cattle, goats, pigs, and sheep are thought to be domesticated between 8,000-9,000 years ago. Dogs were domesticated around 12,000 years ago. p 309

1st Agricultural Revolution

Around the year 8000 B.C., humans first domesticated plants and animals and no longer relied entirely on hunting and gathering. This was possible since the climate was changing at the end of the Ice Age, so hunters and gatherers were able to build permanent settlements where they discovered plant cultivation. p 308

What type of fish is threatening the Great Lakes and rivers in America?

Asian carp

The link between government subsidies, agriculture industry, food industry, and American diet.

Because the government subsidizes corn, farmers grow a lot of corn. With the surplus of corn, animal feed is changing from traditional, natural grass to corn. Additionally, scientists come up with different ways to arrange the compounds of corn to create different foods. With the large amounts of corn and ways make food from corn, the American diet largely consists of different forms of corn.

Hunter-Gatherers

Before agriculture, all humans survived through hunting for animals, fishing, and/or gathering plants. Usually, men were the hunters and women were the gatherers. They lived in small groups no larger than 50 persons and traveled often, following the food sources. Today, 250,000 people (0.05% in the world) are hunter-gatherers. They live in Australia, islands, Africa, or around the Amazon rainforest.

Where is the largest (cattle) feedlot in the world?

Broken Bow, Nebraska.

Overfishing

Capturing fish faster than they can reproduce, which causes the populations of some fish species in the oceans and lakes to decline. p 325

What is the leading country of fish production?

China

What is the most illegal drug trafficked in metric tons?

Cocaine

Grain Farming

Crops on these farms are grown primarily for consumption by humans rather than by livestock. Farms are large, heavily mechanized, and oriented to consumer preferences. They sell their output to manufacturers of food products. The most important crop grown is wheat. The United States is the largest producer of wheat among developed countries but ranks third among all countries behind China and India since wheat production in developing countries has been increasing. In North America, large-scale grain production is concentrated in the winter wheat belt through Kansas, Colorado, and Oklahoma, the spring wheat belt through the Dakotas, Montana, and southern, Saskatchewan in Canada, and the Palouse region of Washington State.

Truck farms are replacing what types of farms?

Dairyfarming

Food Security

Defined by the UN as physical, social, and economic access at all times to safe and nutritious food sufficient to meet dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life. p 314

What is deforestation and what problems are associated with it?

Deforestation is the clearance of forest land. Forests play an important part in maintaining the health of the environment, so it has negative effects on the environment. The land is put to other uses such as urbanization or farmland.

Undernourishment

Dietary energy consumption that is continuously below the minimum requirement for maintaining a healthy life and carrying out light physical activity. p 343

Shifting Cultivation

Farmers clear land for planting by slashing vegetation and burning the debris, and then grow crops on a cleared field for a few years until soil nutrients are depleting, and then leave it fallow for many years for the soil can recover. p 320

Seed Selection

Farmers saving the seeds from the plants with the most desirable characteristics in order to improve crop yields (happens in the field, not GMO).

Extensive Farming

Farming practices that involve putting relatively little energy into the land for the calories extracted, so more dependence is put on machinery; usually in developed countries. Examples: mixed crops/livestock, dairying, grain, ranching, Mediterraneans, commercial gardening (truck farming).

Intensive Farming

Farming that requires a lot of labor to produce food; more hands-on with less machinery; usually in developing countries. Examples: intensive subsistence agriculture, pastoral nomadism, shifting cultivation, plantation.

Genetically Modified (GM) Crops and Characteristics

GMO seeds are genetically modified to survive when herbicides and insecticides are sprayed on fields to kill weeds and insects. They result in higher yields, increased nutrition, and more resistance to pests. p 338

Africa's, India's, and Europe's concern for GM foods

Health: consuming too much GM foods can reduce the effectiveness of antibiotics and destroy longstanding ecological balances in local agriculture; Europeans believe that GM food is not as nutritious as traditionally produced food. Export problems: European countries require GM foods to be labeled, making African farmers fearful that they will lose European consumers. Increased dependence of the US: US-based transnational corporations manufacture most of the GMO seeds, so Africans fear that they will become too reliant on these companies and the US. p 338

Desertification

Human actions cause the land to deteriorate to a desert-like condition. This may happen to some farmland, which causes it to be abandoned for lack of water. p 333

Wet Rice Not Dominant Intensive Subsistence Agriculture

In India and northeastern Chia where summer precipitation levels are too low and winters are too harsh, agriculture revolves around crops other than wet rice. Wheat, followed by barely, are the most important crops, although cash crops and other grains and legumes for household consumption are also grown. p 323

Primary source of protein: Developed vs. Developing

In developed countries, the leading source of protein is meat products, accounting for 1/3 of all protein intake. In developing countries, cereal grains provide the largest share of protein, so meat only accounts for /10 of all protein intake. p 314

Main Agricultural Regions in Developing Countries

Intensive subsistence, wet-rice dominant: East Asia and South Asia. Intensive subsistence, crops other than rice dominant: East Asia and South Asia where growing rice is difficult (drier). Pastoral nomadism: drylands of Southwest Asia and North Africa, Central Asia, and East Asia. Plantation: tropical and subtropical Latin America, sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, and Southeast Asia. p 318

Where did the Green Revolution have a big impact? Which continent really did not benefit from the green revolution?

It impacted India, Asia, and Latin America among other places. Developing countries that can not afford the machinery and fertilizers needed to make the miracle seeds effective did not benefit from the green revolution. p 335

Fallow Land

Land that has nothing planted on it so soil can recover. p 320

What % of people in the world participate in shifting cultivation?

Less than 5% of the world's people. p 321

Main Agricultural Regions in Developed Countries

Mixed crop and livestock: midwest US and central Europe. Dairying: northeastern US, southeastern Canada, and northwestern Europe. Grain: north-central United States, south-central Canada, and Eastern Europe Ranching: western North America (dry), southeastern Latin America, Central Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, and South Pacific. Mediterranean: lands surrounding the Mediterranean Sea, western US, southern tip of Africa, and Chile. Commercial gardening: southeastern US and southeastern Australia. p 318

Mediterranean Agriculture

Most of the crops are grown for human consumption rather than for animal feed. It is primarily horticulture: the growing of fruits, vegetables, flowers, and tree crops. It exists primarily on the lands that border the Mediterranean Sea in Southern Europe, North Africa, and western Asia. Farmers in California, central Chile, the southwestern part of South Africa, and southwestern Australia also practice this agriculture.

What is the difference between a renewable and nonrenewable resource?

Renewable resources are easily replenished, while nonrenewable resources like fossil fuels

Why is shifting cultivation expected to diminish during the 21st century?

Shifting cultivation is being replaced by logging, cattle ranching, and the cultivation of cash crops. Developing countries see shifting cultivation as an inefficient way to grow food in a hungry world. As the importance of tropical rain forests to the global environment has become recognized, developing countries have been pressured to restrict further destruction of them. p 321

What are some challenges for farmers in developed countries?

Since agriculture is so reliant on the unpredictable climate, their income is always fluctuating, making farming a less profitable job than other careers. The loss of farmland due to urbanization and desertification also poses a threat. Additionally, most of the farming in developed countries is commercial, so oftentimes the farmers have little power over their farms and are controlled by larger cooperations.

Types of crops grown in different regions through shifting cultivation

Southeast Asia: upland rice. South America: maize (corn) and manioc (cassava). Africa: sorghum. In some regions: yams, sugarcane, plantain, and vegetables. p 320

What continent did goat and cattle come from?

Southwest (Central) Asia

The 3rd Agricultural Revolution

The Green Revolution: dates as far back as the 1930's when agricultural scientists in the American Midwest began experimenting with seed varieties to increase crop yields. High yield varieties of rice in Asia followed wheat in Mexico and the result has been great progress in global food production in the developing regions. The new varieties do require more inputs of chemical fertilizers and pesticides thus sparking controversy about the ultimate success of the Green Revolution. p 334

Loss of Farmland due to Expanding Suburbs

The United States has lost 200,000 hectares (500,000 acres) of prime agricultural land as urban areas grow in population and land area; farms on the periphery are replaced by urban land uses, especially along the edge cities on the East Coast of the US. In Maryland, Washington and Baltimore have threatened so much agricultural land GIS consultants have identified the "best" lands to protect. p 332

Dietary Energy Consumption

The amount of food that an individual consumes, measure by the kilocalorie (kcal), or Calorie in the United States. p 312

Gene Revolution

The application of biotechnology to agriculture, which resulted in GMOs (genetically modified organisms). p 338

Swidden

The area of land cleared by slashing and burning. p 320

Intertillage

The clearing of rows in the field through the use of hoes, rakes, & other manual equipment. (not in book, but found in Canvas study guide)

What influences the choice of crops grown in developing countries?

The climate, amount of labor/cost of growing, and relative location to consumers.

Ranching

The commercial grazing of livestock over an extensive area. It is conducted in several developed countries, and increasingly in developing countries. China is the leading producer of meat, followed by the United States and then Brazil; a large portion of the pampas of Argentina, southern Brazil, and Uruguay is devoted to grazing cattle and sheep, although much of the land in the US has been converted from ranching to the more profitable crop growing. p 331

Factors of Food Prices

The cost of labor, land, transportation, production.

Aquaculture/Aquafarming

The cultivation of seafood under controlled conditions. p 324

What is agriculture?

The deliberate modification of Earth's surface through cultivation of plants and rearing of animals to obtain sustenance or economic gain. p 308

Wet Rice Dominant Intensive Subsistence Agriculture

The dominant type of agriculture in southeastern China, East India, and much of Southeast Asia. Rice is planted on dry land in a nursery and then moved as seedlings to a flooded field (sawah in Indonesia, paddy in Malay) to promote growth. p 322

Horticulture

The growing of fruits, vegetables, and tree crops. (usually associated with Mediterranean but also truck farms)

Mixed Crop and Livestock Farming

The integration of crops and livestock where most of the crops grown are fed to animals rather than consumed directly by humans. In turn, the livestock supply manure to improve soil fertility to frow more crops. Most of the land area is dedicated to growing crops, but more than 3/4 of income comes from animal products. Farmers are able to distribute the workload more evenly through the year, since fields require less attention in the winter than in the spring and fall, while livestock require attention all year; seasonal variation in income are also reduced since livestock products can be sold throughout the year although most of the income from crops only comes during the harvest season. The most important region in the US is called the corn belt since corn is the crop most frequently planted in these farms. p 328

Why was shifting cultivation sustainable in the past?

The population was smaller in the past and was more forestland (less deforestation), so the ratio of land to people was larger, so there was enough land to provide for everyone and have enough time to recover and remain fallow until the land was reused.

Crop Rotation

The practice of rotating use of different fields from crop to crop each year to avoid exhausting the soil. p 323

Subsistence Agriculture

The production of food is primarily for consumption by the farmer's family in developing countries. Much of the work is done with hand tools and animal power, and farms are smaller since the farmer only has to provide for their family. 42% of workers in developing countries are farmers. p 310

Commercial Agriculture

The production of food is primarily for sale off the farm in developed countries. A small number of commercial farmers can feed many people because they rely on machinery to perform work. Commercial farms are relatively large since they provide food for themselves and the rest of the region. 3% of workers in developed countries are farmers. p 310

Milkshed

The ring surrounding a city from which milk can be supplied without spoiling. p 330

Grain

The seed from a cereal grass. p 312

2nd Agricultural Revolution

The series of improvements and techniques in the 18th and early 19th centuries which happened in Great Britain, the Netherlands and Denmark, where European farming underwent changes that led to an agricultural surplus which was enough to improve life expectancies and grow populations. The improvements allowed for more workers for industry as fewer farmers were needed to work the land and gain the food supply that was needed. (found in Canvas study guide, not in textbook)

Agribusiness

The system of commercial farming found in developed countries where farming is integrated into a large food-production industry. p 326

Government Involvement and Farmers' Profits

To make food affordable for urban residents, governments keep agricultural prices low. constrained by price controls, farmers are unable to sell their commodities at a profit. p 345

Double Cropping

Usually involves alternating between wet rice in the summer where there is more rain and a dry crop such as wheat or barely in the drier winter season to obtain two harvests per year from one field. p 322

Three Leading Cereal Grains

Wheat, Rice, and Maize. p 312

Three leading ceral grian

Wheat, rice, and maize.

The Bedouins and the Masai practice this type of 'agriculture'

pastoral nomadism

Casssava and sorghum are the largest share of dietary energy in this continent

sub-Saharan Africa