APHuG Dec. 4 AGRICULTURAL REVOLUTIONS What is it? Where did it begin?

 Humanity’s only “economic” activity for at least 90% of our existence.  Low population densities.  Wide variety of natural foodstuffs eaten. ORIGINS OF AGRICULTURE What stage of the DTM belongs to hunter-gatherer societies?

Hunters and gatherers lived in small groups. The men hunted game or fished, and the women collected berries, nuts, and roots. This division of labor sounds like a stereotype but is based on evidence from archaeology and anthropology. The group 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 at various locations.

1 ST AGRICULTURAL REVOLUTION, 8,000 BCE  Over thousands of years, plant cultivation apparently evolved from a combination of accidental occurrences and deliberate experiments.  Vegetative Planting: Direct cloning from existing plants, such as cutting stems and dividing roots.  Seed Agriculture: More complex; involves seed selection, sowing, watering, and well-timed harvesting. Defined: The time when humans first domesticated plants and animals and no longer relied entirely on hunting and gathering.

SYSTEMS OF AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTION  Subsistence Agriculture: Practiced by families and villages when they raise only enough animals and crops to feed themselves.  Commercial Agriculture: Produces goods for sale in the city or on the international market.

 Shifting cultivation: occurs when traditional farmers had to abandon plots of land after the soil became infertile.  Only occurs in areas where population densities are low.  Slash-and-burn farming: trees are cut down and burned as a method of clearing land for cultivation. TYPES OF SUBSISTENCE AGRICULTURE

 Pastoral nomadism: form of extensive subsistence agriculture. Defined: Animal herds are moved from one forage area to another in a cyclical pattern of migration. TYPES OF SUBSISTENCE AGRICULTURE Tibetan Herdsmen Wodaabe of the Sahara

Why? Agriculture needed to move beyond subsistence farming to generate the kinds of surpluses needed to feed the people working in the factories! What?  Tools: Metal plows, Reapers, Cotton Gin, Seed Drill, Tractors  New Crops: Potatoes and Corn  Chemical Pesticides/Fertilizers  Hybrid and genetically modified crops 2 ND AGRICULTURAL REVOLUTION,

3 RD AGRICULTURAL REVOLUTION  Also known as the Green Revolution (biotechnology, genetic engineering and use of chemical fertilizers)  Manipulation of seed varieties to increase crop yields  Crops impacted: corn, wheat, rice (double-cropping, triple cropping)  Decreased famine in numerous areas  “Hunger Areas” greatly impacted