AP Human Geography Chapter 10: Agriculture

1. Commercial agriculture characterized by integration of different steps in the food-processing industry, usually through ownership by large corporations. 2. General term for the businesses that provide the vast array of goods and services that support the agriculture industry. Example: Examples of agribusinesses include seed and agrichemical producers like Dow AgroSciences, DuPont, Monsanto, and Syngenta; biofuels, and micro-ingredients, ADM, grain transport and processing; John Deere, farm machinery producer; Ocean Spray, farmer's cooperative; and Purina Farms, agritourism farm.

1. A form of food production in which fields are in permanent cultivation using plows, animals, and techniques of soil and water control. 2. Large-scale cultivation using plows harnessed to animals or more powerful energy sources. Example: USDA (United States Department of Agriculture) is a great example in our agriculture in America.

1. Husks of grain separated from the seed by threshing. 2. The separation of seed from the husk. Example: Wheat grains found after threshing is an example of chaff.

1. Agriculture undertaken primarily to generate products for sale off the farm. 2. The production of crops for sale, crops intended for widespread distribution to wholesaler or retail outlets. Example: An example could be the larger crop farmers, feedlot livestock farmers, or the small organic farmer who go to the farmer's market to sell their produce.

1. Grain or fruit gathered from a field as a harvest during a particular season. 2. Any plant cultivated by people for food or profit. Example: Examples would be corn, wheat, apples, oranges, lettuce, potatoes, etc.

1. The practice of rotating use of different fields from crop to crop each year, to avoid exhausting the soil. 2. Planting different crops at different times to avoid nutrient depletion. Example: Feild A grows x crop one year, y crop the next year, z crop the year after that, and then goes back to x crop once the cycle has restarted.

1. The process of stripping the land of its trees. 2. Destruction of forest land. Example: The destruction of the Amazon Rainforest for urban sprawl.

1. Degradation of land, especially in semiarid areas, primarily because of human actions like excessive crop planting, animal grazing, and tree cutting. 2. A form of land degradation in which 10% of a land's productivity is lost due to erosion or other factors. It can result in the expansion of desert areas. Example: A good U.S. example of desertification is, of course, the "Dust Bowl" in the Great Plains that took place during the drought of the 1930s.

1. Harvesting twice a year from the same field. 2. Growing more than one crop a year on the same land. Example: An example of double cropping might be to harvest a wheat crop by early summer and then plant corn or soybeans on that acreage for harvest in the fall.

1. Rapid diffusion of new agricultural technology, especially new high-yield seeds and fertilizers. 2. A shift in agricultural practices in the twentieth century that included new management techniques, mechanization, fertilization, irrigation, and improved crop varieties, and resulted in increased food output. Example: The Green Revolution introduced robust grain crops to the developing world but also changed their traditional methods of agriculture, especially in India.

1. The growing of fruits, vegetables, and flowers. 2. A method of cultivation in which hand tools powered by human muscles are used and in which land use is extensive. Example: Examples would include things like herbology, silvoculture, crop science, pasture and rangeland science and management, plant biology, etc.

1. A form of subsistence agriculture in which farmers must expend a relatively large amount of effort to produce the maximum feasible yield from a parcel of land. 2. Term applied to subsistence agriculture that means that farmers must work more intensively to subsist on a parcel of land. Example: The best examples are in developing countries were the farmer and his family lives from year to year on what they produce, usually a staple food crop like rice, corn or wheat, and a few animals like goats, sheep, or pigs plus a few chickens, to supply meat, eggs and milk.

1. The area surrounding a city from which milk is supplied. 2. The ring surrounding a city from which milk can be supplied without spoiling. Example: A milkshed could be 100 miles around a city.

1. A form of subsistence agriculture based on herding domesticated animals. 2. A traditional subsistence agricultural system in which practitioners depend on the seasonal movements of livestock within marginal natural environments. Example: Camel Herders, Shepard and his flock.

1. 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. 2. A large-scale agricultural enterprise growing commercial crops and usually employing coerced or slave labor. Example: Sugar Cane plantation in South.

1. The most productive farmland. 2. Term for the most productive farmland. Example: Much Prime agricultural land has been lost due to show times.

1. A form of commercial agriculture in which livestock graze over an extensive area. 2. The practice of raising grazing livestock such as cattle or sheep for meat or other products. Example: Cattle Ranching in West Texas.

1. System of planting crops on ridge tops in order to reduce farm production costs and promote greater soil conservation. 2. A system of planting crops on ridge tops. Example: Planting corn and wheat on ridge tops.

1. A form of subsistence agriculture in which people shift activity from one field to another; each field is used for crops for relatively few years and left fallow for a relatively long period. 2. Cultivation of crops in tropical forest clearings in which the forest vegetation has been removed by cutting and burning. These clearings are usually abandoned after a few years in favor of newly cleared forestland. Also known as slash-and-burn agriculture. Example: Shifting cultivation is practiced by nearly 250 million people, especially in the tropical rain forests of South America, Central and West Africa, and Southeast Asia.

1. Another name for shifring cultivation, so named because fields are cleared by slashing the vegetation and burning the debris. 2. A farming technique in which trees are cut down and burned to clear and fertilize the land. Example: An example would be subsistence farmers to provide temporary fertility to the soil by burning plants.

1. Agriculture designed primarily to provide food for direct consumption by the farmer and the farmer's family. 2. Farmer produces just enough to support himself and his family wih little left for purchasing manufactured goods. Example: The best examples are in developing countries were the farmer and his family lives from year to year on what they produce, usually a staple food crop like rice, corn or wheat, and a few animals like goats, sheep, or pigs plus a few chickens, to supply meat, eggs and milk.

1. Farming methods that preserve long-term productivity of land and minimize pollution, typically by rotating soil- restoring crops with cash crops and reducing in-puts of fertilizer and pesticides. 2. Agriculture that fulfills the need for food and fiber while enhancing the quality of the soil, minimizing the use of nonrenewable resources, and allowing economic viability for the farmer. Example: Crop Rotation

1. The seasonal migration of livestock between mountains and lowland pastures. 2. A seasonal periodic movement of pastoralists and their livestock between highland and lowland pastures. Example: Moving cattle up and down the Swiss Alps.

1. Commercial gardening and fruit farming, so named because truck was a Middle English word meaning batering or the exchange of commodities. 2. Commercial gardening and fruit farming. Example: For example, in England, south Sussex was famous for growing tomatoes for the London market that were delivered by train

1. Rice planted on dryland in a nursery, then moved to a deliberately flooded field to promote growth. 2. Rice planted on dryland in a nursery, then moved to a deliberately flooded field (sawah) to promote growth. Example: Seen primarily in the East, especially in China.

1. A model that explains the location of agricultureal activities in a commercial, profit-making economy. A process of spatial competition allocates various farming activities into rings around a central market city, with profit-earning capability the determining force in how far a crop locates from the market. 2. An agricultural model that spatially describes agricultural activity in terms of rent. Activities that require intensive cultivation and cannot be transported over great distances pay higher rent to be close to the market. Conversely, activities that are more extensive , with goods that are easy to transport, are located farther from the market where rent is less. Example: Suppose the land surrounding a city market can be used for: truck farms for growing tomatoes orchards for growing apples wheat farms