unit 5(agriculture and rural land use)

• Agrarian


  concerning farms, farmers, or the use of land
• Agribusiness


  Commercial agriculture characterized by integration of different steps in the food-processing industry, usually through ownership by large corporations.
• Agricultural landscape


  The land that we farm on and what we choose to put were on our fields. Effects how much yield one gets from their plants.
• Aquaculture


  Raising marine and freshwater fish in ponds and underwater cages
• Blue Revolution


  New techniques of fish farming that may contribute as much to human nutrition as miracle cereal grains but also may create social and environmental problems.
• Biodiversity


  the variety of life in the world or in a particular habitat or ecosystem.
• Biotechnology


  A form of technology that uses living organisms, usually genes, to modify products, to make or modify plants and animals, or to develop other microorganisms for specific purposes.
• capital-intensive agriculture


  Form of agriculture that uses mechanical goods such as machinery, tools, vehicles, and facilities to produce large amounts of agricultural goods-a process requiring very little human labor.
• carrying capacity


  Largest number of individuals of a population that a environment can support
• Cash crop


  a crop produced for its commercial value rather than for use by the grower.
• cereal grain


  A grass yielding grain for food.
• collective farms


  Government owned farms, workers were paid by government and they shared profits from products.
• Columbian Exchange


  The exchange of plants, animals, diseases, and technologies between the Americas and the rest of the world following Columbus's voyages.
• Commerical Agriculture


  Agriculture undertaken primarily to generate products for sale off the farm.
• Commodity Chain


  series of links connecting the many places of production and distribution and resulting in a commodity that is then exchanged on the world market
• Community Supported Agriculture


  network between agricultural producers and consumers whereby consumers pledge support to a farming operation in order to receive a share of the output from the farming operation
• comparative advantage


  the ability to produce a good at a lower opportunity cost than another producer
• Conservation


  the principle (which Piaget believed to be a part of concrete operational reasoning) that properties such as mass, volume, and number remain the same despite changes in the forms of objects
• crop rotation


  The practice of rotating use of different fields from crop to crop each year, to avoid exhausting the soil.
• Dairying (Dairy Farming)


  An agricultural activity involving the raising of livestock, most commonly cows and goats, for dairy products such as milk, cheese, and butter.
• Deforestation


  Destruction of forests
• Desertification


  Degradation of land, especially in semiarid areas, primarily because of human actions like excessive crop planting, animal grazing, and tree cutting.
• Dietary shifts


  movement from a diet of processed food, meat, fat, and sugar to one that will promote good health, ideal weight, and prevent chronic disease (fruits, vegetables)
• Domestication


  the taming of animals for human use, such as work or as food
• Doublecropping


  Harvesting twice a year from the same field.
• Economies of scale


  factors that cause a producer's average cost per unit to fall as output rises
• Enclosure acts


  a series of United Kingdom Acts of Parliament which enclosed open fields and common land in the country, creating legal property rights to land that was previously considered common.
• export commodity


  goods sent from one country to another for sale
• extensive agriculture


  An agricultural system characterized by low inputs of labor per unit land area.
• Fair trade


  trade in which fair prices are paid to producers in developing countries.
• Fallow


  plowed but not seeded; inactive; reddish-yellow; land left unseeded; to plow but not seed
• Farm to table


  Path of food from the growth of raw product, through processing, preparation, and presentation, to the final consumer.
• Farm subsidy


  a form of aid and insurance given by the federal government to certain farmers and agribusinesses
• Feedlot


  a plot of land on which livestock are fattened for market
• Fertlizer


  Product that farmers apply on their fields to enrich the soil by restoring lost nutrients
• First Agricultural Revolution


  Dating back 10,000 years, the First Agricultural Revolution achieved plant domestication and animal domestication
• Food chain


  A series of steps in which organisms transfer energy by eating and being eaten
• Food desert


  An area in a developed country where healthy food is difficult to obtain
• food security


  Physical, social, and economic access at all times to safe and nutritious food sufficient to meet dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life.
• Forestry


  the planting, growing, and harvesting of trees