AGRICULTURE

AGRICULTURE

INTRODUCTION

• AGRICULTURE IS A PRIMARY ACTIVITIES .• IN THE WORLD 50 % OF PEOPLE ARE BUSY IN AGRICULTURAL ACTIVITY.

• ABOUT 2/3 OF INDIANS ARE AT THE MERCY OF FARMING.

TYPPES OF FARMING• SUBSITENCE FARMING

• COMMERICAL FARMING

SUBSITENCE FARMING

• Subsistence agriculture is self-sufficiency farming in which the farmers focus on growing enough food to feed themselves and their families.

• The typical subsistence farm has a range of crops and animals needed by the family to feed and clothe themselves during the year.

SUBSITENCE FARMING [TYPES]1. Shifting agriculture • In this type of agriculture, a patch of forest land is cleared by a

combination of felling and burning, and crops are grown.

• After 2-3 years the fertility of the soil begins to decline, the land is abandoned and the farmer moves to clear a fresh piece of land elsewhere in the forest as the process continues.

• While the land is left fallow the forest regrows in the cleared area and soil fertility and biomass is restored. After a decade or more, the farmer may return to the first piece of land.

• This form of agriculture is sustainable at low population densities, but higher population loads require more frequent clearing which prevents soil fertility from recovering, opens up more of the forest canopy, and encourages scrub at the expense of large trees, eventually resulting in deforestation and heavy erosion and leads to global warming.

CONTINUED[PART1]. . . ………2.Nomadic herding• In this type of farming people migrate along with their animals from one place to another in search of fodder for their animals.

• Generally they rear cattle, sheep, goats, camels and/or yaks for milk, skin, meat and wool

• . This way of life is common in parts of central and western Asia, India, east and south-west Africa and northern Eurasia.

• Examples are the nomadic Bhotiyas and Gujjars of the Himalayas.

[PART2]……3.Intensive subsistence farming• . In very densely populated countries like India and China, farmers

use their small land holdings to produce enough for their own consumption, while the little remaining produce is used for exchange against other goods.

• The cultivators use simple tools to produce the crop. It results in much more foodbeing produced per acre compared to other subsistence patterns .

• These farmers try to obtain maximum yield from the available lands by intensifying cultivation techniques, including the preparation of paddy fields which can be used year after year.

• In the most intensive situation, farmers may even create terraces along steep hillsides to cultivate rice paddies. Such fields are found in densely populated parts of Asia,such as in The Philippines.

• They may also intensify by using manure, artificial irrigation and animal waste as fertilizer.

COMMERICAL FARMING

• Commercial agriculture is a large-scale production of crops for sale, intended for widespread distribution to wholesalers or retail outlets.

• In commercial farming crops such as wheat, maize, tea, coffee, sugarcane, cashew, rubber, banana, cotton are harvested and sold in the world markets.

• Commercial agriculture includes livestock production and livestock grazing. Due to the expensive nature of capital formation and implementation of technological processes, the landowners of such farms are often large agricultural corporations (especially in developing countries).

TYPES 1.Intensive Commercial Farming is system of agriculture in which relatively large amounts of capital or labour are applied to relatively smaller areas of land. It is practiced in countries where the population pressure is reducing the size of landholdings. • The State of West Bengal in India provides one of the best examples of intensive commercial farming.

CONTINUED2.Extensive Commercial Farming is a system of agriculture in which relatively small amounts of capital or labour investment are applied to relatively large areas of land.• At times, the land is left fallow to regain its fertility. It is mostly mechanized as labour is very expensive or may not be available at all.

• It usually occurs at the margin of the agricultural system, at a great distance from market or on poor land of limited potential. Crops grown are sugarcane, rice and wheat.

….• Plantation Agriculture: Plantation is a large farm or estate usually in a tropical or sub-tropical country where crops are grown for sale in distant markets rather than local consumption.

MAJOR CROPS• Major crops include maize (corn), wheat, rice & millets.

• Jute , cotton are fiber crops.

Beverage crops are coffee and tea

MAIZE• Maize is central to Mexican food. Virtually every dish in Mexican cuisine uses maize.

• On form of grain or cornmeal, maize is the main ingredient of tortillas, tamales, pozole, atole and all the dishes based on them, like tacos, quesadillas, chilaquiles, enchiladas, tostadas and many more.

• In Mexico even a fungus of maize, known as huitlacoche is considered a delicacy.

WHEAT•

This grain is grown on more land area than any other commercial food. 

• World trade in wheat is greater than for all other crops combined.

•  Globally, wheat is the leading source of vegetable protein in human food, having a higher protein content than other major cereals, maize (corn) or rice.

•  In terms of total production tonnages used for food, it is currently second to rice as the main human food crop and ahead of maize, after allowing for maize's more extensive use in animal feeds.

RICE• Rice is the seed of the monocot plants Oryza sativa (Asian rice) or Oryza glaberrima (African rice).

• As a cereal grain, it is the most widely consumed staple food for a large part of the world's human population, especially in Asia.

• It is the grain with the second-highest worldwide production, after maize (corn), according to data for 2010.[1]

MILLETS• The millets are a group of highly variable small-seeded 

grasses, widely grown around the world as cereal crops or grains for both human food and fodder.

• They do not form a taxonomic group, but rather a functional or agronomic one.

• Millets are important crops in the semi-arid tropics of Asia and Africa (especially in India, Nigeria, and Niger), with 97% of millet production in developing countries.

JUTE• Jute is a long, soft, shiny vegetable fiber that can be spun into coarse, strong threads.

• It is produced from plants in the genus Corchorus, which was once classified with the family Tiliaceae, more recently with Malvaceae, and has now been reclassified as belonging to the family Sparrmanniaceae.

• "Jute" is the name of the plant or fiber that is used to make burlap, Hessian or gunny cloth

COTTON• Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective

capsule, around the seeds of cotton plants of the genusGossypium.

• The fiber is almost pure cellulose. Under natural conditions, the cotton bolls will tend to increase the dispersion of the seeds.

• The plant is a shrub native to tropical and subtropical regions around the world, including the Americas, Africa, and India. The greatest diversity of wild cotton species is found in Mexico, followed by Australia and Africa.

COFFEE• Coffee is a brewed beverage prepared from the roasted

seeds of several species of an evergreen shrub of the genus Coffea.

• The two most common sources of coffee beans are the highly regarded Coffea arabica, and the "robusta" form of the hardier Coffea canephora. The latter is resistant to the coffee leaf rust (Hemileia vastatrix), but has a more bitter taste.

• Coffee plants are cultivated in over 70 countries, primarily in equatorial Latin America, Southeast Asia,and Africa. Once ripe, coffee "berries" are picked, processed, and dried to yield the seeds inside.

• The seeds are then roasted to varying degrees, depending on the desired flavor, before being ground and brewed to create coffee.

TEA• Tea is an aromatic beverage commonly prepared by pouring hot or boiling water over cured leaves of the tea plant, Camellia sinensis.

• After water, tea is the most widely consumed beverage in the world.

•  It has a cooling, slightly bitter, and astringent flavour that many people enjoy.