1. Human Geography: Places and
Regions in Global Context, 5e
Chapter 8: Agriculture and Food Production
Paul L. Knox & Sallie A. Marston
PowerPoint Author: Keith M. Bell
2. Overview
Today agriculture is a highly complex, globally integrated system. It was not
always that way. Agriculture has gone through three revolutions, each
transforming the practice in major ways. Agriculture of the present is highly
industrialized through the use of mechanization, chemical fertilizers, and through
links to other sectors of the economy such as food processing and
transportation. This chapter explores different kinds of agriculture and the
regions in which each is practiced. Students should be aware of how agricultural
practices in, for example, the tropics and in temperate regions differ from each
other.
Modern agriculture is the major focus of this chapter, especially the process of
industrialization. Students should be aware of these changes. Agriculture is now
part of the world economic system, and hence its economic, social, and
environmental impacts are also global in nature. This process is easy to illustrate
by examining the sources of foods commonly consumed in the United States
and the process by which they reach their final market.
3. Chapter Objectives
• The objectives of this chapter are to:
– Understand traditional agricultural geography
– Examine the agricultural revolution and its
industrialization
– Investigate the forces of agricultural
globalization
– Explore the social and technological change
in global agricultural restructuring
– Examine the relationship between the
environment and agricultural industrialization
4. Chapter Outline
• Chapter Outline • The Environment and Agricultural
• Traditional Agricultural Geography Industrialization (p. 327)
(p. 298) – Impact of the environment on
– Types of agriculture agriculture
– Shifting cultivation – Impact of agriculture on the
environment
– Intensive subsistence agriculture
–
• Problems and Prospects in the
Pastoralism
Global Food System (p. 330)
• Agricultural Revolution and – Famine and undernutrition
Industrialization (p. 305) – Genetically modified organisms
– First agricultural revolution – Urban agriculture
– Second agricultural revolution
–
• Conclusion (p. 335)
Third agricultural revolution
– Industrialization of agriculture
• Global Change in Food Production
and Consumption (p. 315)
– Forces of globalization
– Agricultural change and development
policies in Latin America
– Agribusiness
– Food regimes and fast food
5. Geography Matters
• 8.1 Geography Matters—The Blue
Revolution and Global Shrimp (p. 310)
– The growth of the global shrimp trade and its impacts
• 8.2 Geography Matters—A Look at the Green
Revolution (p. 318)
– Feeding the world’s growing population
• 8.3 Window on the World—The New
Geography of Food and Agriculture in New
Zealand (p. 328)
– Changes in New Zealand’s agriculture
6. Agriculture and Food
Production
Agriculture has been transformed
into a globally integrated system.
Agriculture has progressed through
three revolutionary phases,
domestication through
biotechnology.
The introduction of new
technologies has dramatically
changed the process of agriculture.
Shifting cultivation, subsistence
agriculture and pastoralism has
been largely replaced by industrial
agriculture.
The contemporary agro-commodity
system is organized around a chain
of agribusiness components.
Transformations in agriculture have
had dramatic impacts on the
environment.
7. Traditional Agricultural Geography
• Agriculture is a science, an
art, and a business directed
at the cultivation of crops
and the raising of livestock
for sustenance and profit.
– Agrarian
– Hunting and gathering
– Subsistence agriculture
– Commercial agriculture
8. Pesticide Spraying: Nicaragua
The use of chemical, mechanical, and biotechnological innovations and
applications has significantly intensified farming practices. The decline
in the number of people employed in farming in both the core and
periphery is perhaps the biggest change in agriculture.
9. Global Distribution of Agriculture
Dramatic differences between core and periphery exists in regards to
commercial versus subsistence crops. The core is dominated by
commercial endeavors, a definite economic advantage.
10. Areas of Plant and Animal
Domestication
Subsistence agriculture replaced hunting and gathering activities in many
parts of the globe when people understood the advantages of a secure food
source. Human civilization, writing, economics, and government developed.
11. Shifting Cultivation
South America: processed
China: slash-and-burn field
A form of agriculture usually found in tropical forests where farmers
aim to maintain soil fertility by rotating fields. Shifting cultivation is
different from crop rotation, whereby fields are continually used but
with complimentary crops that balance nutrient usage of the soil.
12. Farming Techniques
Intertillage Intensive subsistence
In the tropics, tubers predominate, while grains like rice are planted in flooded fields
of subtropical climes. Carbohydrate crops form the backbone of modern cultivation.
13. Pastoralism: Mongolia
Pastorialism involves the breeding and herding of animals to satisfy the
human needs for food, shelter, and clothing. Most pastoralists practice
transhumance, the movement of herds according to seasonal rhythms:
warmer, lowland areas in the winter, and cooler, highland areas in
summer.
14. Agricultural Revolution and
Industrialization
• The First Agricultural Revolution
– Founded on the development of seed agriculture and
the use of the plow and draft animals
– Domestication of plants and animals allowed for the
rise of settled ways of life
• The Second Agricultural Revolution
– Important elements include:
• Dramatic improvements in outputs, such as crop and livestock
yields
• Such innovations as the improved yoke for oxen and the
replacement of the ox with the horse
• New inputs to agricultural production, such as the application
of fertilizers and field drainage systems
15. The First Agricultural Revolution: Punjab, India
In many parts of the world, agriculturalists rely on draft animals to
prepare land for cultivation. By expanding the amount of energy applied
to production, draft animals enabled humans to increase food supplies.
16. Agricultural Revolutions and
Industrialization
• The Third Agricultural Revolution
– Three important phases originated in North
America:
• Mechanization: replaced human farm labor with
machines
• Chemical farming with synthetic fertilizers: application
of herbicides, fungicides, and pesticides to crops to
enhance yields
• Globally widespread food manufacturing: adding
economic value to agricultural products (i.e., processing
food between farms and markets)
– The first two phases involve inputs, while the third
involves a complication of farms to firms in the
manufacturing sector.
17. Old and New Farm Machines
Modern harvesting
Vasser student-farmer: 1917 equipment
Contract farming: contemporary agro-food
systems, whereby farmers and
processing/marketing firms have a binding
agreement on production, supply and
purchase of agricultural products
18. Worldwide Growth in Fertilizer Use
One of the biggest ongoing problems with increased fertilizer
usage is the increased runoff and resultant dead zones along ocean
shores.
19. The Industrialization of Agriculture
• Advances in science and
technology—including
mechanical as well as chemical
and biological innovations—
have determined the
industrialization of agriculture
over time.
• Three important developments:
– Changes in rural labor
activities as machines replace
and/or enhance human labor
– The introduction of innovative
inputs to supplement, alter, or
replace biological outputs
– The development of industrial
substitutes for agricultural
products (like Nutrasweet)
20. The Blue Revolution and Global Shrimp
Louisiana shrimpers Thai shrimp farm
Aquaculture claimed to be an answer to feeding the periphery a cheap
form of protein. The growth of the shrimp trade and aquaculture were
rapid, but the so-called “Pink Gold Rush” of shrimp exports has come
with a high social and ecological cost.
28. Effects of the Green Revolution
This map illustrates the increased yields of protein crops, root crops, other cereals,
maize, rice, and wheat brought about by the Green Revolution in selected countries
in Latin America, Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, and the Middle East and North Africa.
29. Biorevolution and Ethics
• The Biorevolution is the
genetic engineering of
plants and animals with
the potential to greatly
exceed the productivity
improvements of the
Green Revolution.
– Biotechnology
– Biopharming
– (Norman) Borlaug
hypothesis
30. Ostrich-rearing Project: Kenya
Masai men are involved in an international development project focused
on ostrich-rearing and ecosystem management.
31. Food and Health: Salinas, California
While consumers worried about salmonella-tainted spinach, farmers were
laying off workers and plowing under their crops as government
inspectors examined their fields. The economic loss was estimated to be
nearly $100 million.
32. GMOs and the Global Food System
A genetically modified organism, or GMO, is any organism that has had
its DNA modified in a laboratory rather than through cross-pollination or
other forms of evolution. Food activist and leader of the French
Confederation Paysanne, Jose Bove, leads a protest march in Paris.
34. Discussion Topics and Lecture
Themes
• What are the differences between subsistence
and commercial agriculture? What regions of the
world tend to practice these two basic
agricultural modes, and why?
– Subsistence agriculture is farming for direct
consumption by the producers, whereas commercial
agriculture is farming primarily for sale. Though
subsistence agriculture is declining, it is still
widespread in the periphery. Commercial agriculture
is dominant in core areas. Subsistence agriculture is
declining because many farmers will modify their
practices as they convert to a cash economy.
35. Discussion Topics and Lecture
Themes
• What is pastoralism? Where is this practice
predominant today? Why in these areas?
– Pastoralism is a subsistence activity that involves
the breeding and herding of animals. It is most
commonly practiced in the cold and dry climates of
deserts, savannas (grasslands), and steppes (lightly
wooded, grassy plains). These drier regions are
usually unsuitable for other forms of agriculture.
36. Discussion Topics and Lecture
Themes
• What were the three agricultural revolutions, and what was the impact of
each?
– The First Agricultural Revolution: beginning before 10,000 bc in Europe and
Southeast Asia and characterized by the development of seed agriculture and
the use of plow and draft animals, it allowed for the development of
settlements. Farming replaced hunting and gathering, and population
increased as the land can support more people.
– The Second Agricultural Revolution: beginning around 1650 ad in Western
Europe and North America, this revolution is characterized by the production
of an agricultural surplus and the development of commercial agriculture, in
which the surplus is sold for profit. The second agricultural revolution was
closely linked to the Industrial Revolution taking place at the same time and in
the same places.
– The Third Agricultural Revolution: beginning in 1928 and characterized by the
development of agriculture as an industry with industrial methods and policies
of production. The emphasis on profit replaces the emphasis on the agrarian
way of life, and farms become large commercial enterprises or
agribusinesses. This revolution is further characterized by mechanization, in
which machines replace human labor, by chemical farming, in which inorganic
fertilizers are applied to the soil to increase yields, and by food manufacturing,
in which agriculture is linked to the processing and refining of foods.
37. Discussion Topics and Lecture
Themes
• What is meant by the industrialization of agriculture? Why has agriculture
become increasingly industrialized? What impacts has this had on the
world as a whole?
– Agricultural industrialization is a process in which the role of the farm is moved
from being the centerpiece of agricultural production into being only one part
of a system of production, storage, processing, distribution, marketing, and
retailing of foods. With agricultural industrialization, the farm becomes only
one link in a large chain of food production. The process of agricultural
industrialization involves three elements:
– Changes in rural labor activities as machines replace and/or improve human
labor.
– The introduction of innovative inputs—fertilizers, hybrid seeds, agrochemicals,
and biotechnologies—to supplement, alter, or replace biological outputs.
– The development of industrial substitutes for agricultural products (Nutrasweet
instead of sugar, and thickeners instead of cornstarch or flour, for example).
– Agricultural industrialization has not occurred everywhere in the world
simultaneously. This process occurred much earlier in the core countries, and
was later diffused to the periphery in a process known as the green revolution,
in which technological innovations were exported to the periphery to increase
crop yields.
– The Geography Matters 8.1 boxed text also provides information on the global
shrimp industry.
38. Discussion Topics and Lecture
Themes
• What is the Green Revolution? What positive
and negative impacts did this process have?
What regions benefited most from the Green
Revolution?
– The Green Revolution refers to the invention and
diffusion of new machines and institutions, from the
core to the periphery, to increase global agricultural
productivity. See the Geography Matters 8.2 boxed
text for a discussion of the implications of the Green
Revolution.
39. Discussion Topics and Lecture
Themes
• What is biotechnology? What effects has biotechnology had on
agriculture? What are the costs and benefits of the application of
modern biotechnological processes such as food irradiation and
cloning?
– Biotechnology is a technique that uses living organisms (or parts of
organisms) to make or modify products, to improve plants and
animals, or to develop microorganisms for specific uses.
Recombinant DNA, tissue culture, cell fusion, enzyme and
fermentation technology, embryo transfer, and cloning are some
examples of the application of biotechnology. While biotechnology
may lead to many improvements in agricultural efficiency, it can also
have negative effects such as the reduced resistance of cloned plants
to diseases. Biotechnological developments can also exacerbate
core-periphery differences, for example, when plants are developed
that can be grown outside their native areas. Private companies
normally patent biotechnological innovations, which means that the
new technologies are not always widely available.
40. Discussion Topics and Lecture
Themes
• How does the local area fit into the food supply
system or food chain? Is it a producer,
distributor, or consumer of agricultural
products, or perhaps a combination of these
factors? How does this affect the local
economy?
– All places are consumers of agricultural products,
and many are distributors of them as well. Even
places that are generally urbanized may have some
agricultural production. Data on these activities can
often be obtained from local and state government
agencies.
41. Discussion Topics and Lecture
Themes
• Think of five sample food items commonly
consumed in the local area. Where are these
items produced? How are they transported to
the local area? Could they be grown locally?
Why or why not?
– Local retailers and wholesalers may be able to
provide information on the local food economy. Also
try the Internet for information on particular food
items and where they are produced.
