Key Issue #1
What to do: Get out stuff for notes. Friday’s quiz will be all vocabulary.
Where did agriculture originate? Agriculture: deliberate cultivation of plants and rearing animals for consumption or selling Local conditions affect choices Some choices based on economics, some based on culture Obstacles not even technology can overcome
Invention of agriculture Began before recorded history so historians disagree exact when but most agree how
Hunter-gatherers Groups of less than 50 Nomadic Collected food daily Focused on survival Conflict only over proximity to food sources Very few left today
Agricultural Revolution 8000 BC? Sudden pop. increase Larger/stable food source Began on accident?
Culture/crop hearths SW Asia-Mesopotamia near Tigris & Euphrates; barley, wheat, olives, lentils East Asia-China/Yangtze/Yellow River; rice and millet Sub-Saharan Africa-sorghum, yams, millet, rice Latin America-beans, maize, potato; what would give way to Aztec, Maya, Inca
Agriculture has globalized with technology and communication improvements Crops have diffused from their original hearth Same with animals
Subsistence Agriculture Over 50% of ppl in less developed countries Growing to consume food/survive Hand tools, animal power Limited to local markets Less money to invest in new technology Smaller farms (less acreage)
Commercial Agriculture Less than 5% of more developed countries Growing to sell it Lots of machinery have replaced human workers (tractors, planters, harvesters, plows) Can sell to markets further away b/c transportation has improved New research: fertilizer, herbicide, hybrids, electronics, irrigation More acreage but also more susceptible to encroaching urban areas Banks to borrow from for new stuff