food production

Cards (33)

  • Why do a high percentage of people in LEDC work in farming:
    • Many people live in rural areas, most common job.
    • Many are subsistence farmers/grow their own food.
    • Much work is labour intensive (lack of machinery) as they cannot afford machines.
    • There are few other employment opportunities/factories etc.
  • Subsistence farming: producing products for family only.
  • Commercial farming: farming for profit, often using chemicals and artificial fertilisers.
  • Irrigation: when crops are watered artificially/given more water.
  • Labour intensive farming: using no machines.
  • Pastoral farming: based on the raising of animals for meat and milk
  • Arable farming: uses land for growing crops, such as wheat, corn, and rice.
  • Mixed farming: a combination of crops and livestock on the same farm.
  • Key causes of food shortages:
    • Poverty, people connot afford food.
    • Overcultivation/overgrazing
    • War/conflicts
    • Can't afford agricultural technology.
    • Inflation/prices of food become too high.
    • Corruption.
  • Why LEDCs suffer from food shortages:
    • Drought.
    • Flooding.
    • Hurricanes, destroy crops so famine.
    • Wars/conflict - Sudan etc.
    • Pests - locusts etc eat crops.
    • Overpopulation/increasing population
    • Lack of technology
    • Lack of space to grow crops.
  • CS: Famine; Ethiopia:
    • Overcultivation as fields are not given fallow time.
    • Overgrazing due to keeping too many cattle, especially in the northern region of Tigray.
    • Lack of investment in irrigation/fertilisers.
    • Still using traditional farming practices such as ploughing up and down slopes.
    • Poverty prevents them buying fertilisers/pesticides.
  • CS: East Africa:
    • 2011 mid 2012 - Horn of Africa.
    • Severe food shortage across Somalia, Dijibouti, Ethiopia ond kenya.
    • Threatened livelihood of 9.5 million.
    • In somalia, mostly affected farmers in the south.
    • Bantu tribe were displaced due to the food shortages.
    • 920,000 refugees had moved to Kenya from Somalia.
    • Tens of thousands of people died in southern Somalia before famine was declared.
  • Solutions to food shortages:
    Food aid:
    • Relief food aid - delivered directly in times of crisis.
    • Programme food aid - given to local government for sale.
    • Project food aid - targeting specific groups in country.
    Green revolution:
    • Creation HYVs to boost yield by 2-4 times.
    • Drought resistant.
    • Responsive to fertilisers.
    • Shorter growing season.
    • Farmers educated and offered credit to buy access to fertilisers and machinery.
  • Poor harvest of crops impacts on LEDCs and MEDCs:
    • LEDC has many subsistence farmers.
    • MEDC not as dependant on agriculture as many people work in tertiary.
    • MEDC import food/can still earn money to buy food.
    • More likely to have stores of food in MEDC'S.
    • Poor harvest in LEDC will cause poverty/in MEDC'S just lower profits.
    • LEDC's can't afford to buy food or new seeds if poor harvest.
    • LEDC government has no money to import food.
  • Increasing output in MEDC:
    • Use of fertilisers.
    • Irrigation
    • Removal of hedgerows (bigger farms so more machinery etc.)
    • Terracing on steep slopes.
    • Pesticides.
    • Hydroponics - plants grow without soil, add nutrients into sand etc.
    • Aeroponics - no soil at all.
  • Increasing output in LEDC:
    • Increased mechanisation i.e. tractors.
    • Greater use of fertilisers.
    • More irrigation.
    • GM crops
    • Education about farming techniques.
  • The farm system: A farm can be described as a system with inputs, processes and outputs.
  • Inputs:
    • Rain
    • Temperature/growing
    • Sunshine
    • Relief
    • Soil
    • Labour
    • Transport
    • Machinery
  • Processes:
    • Sowing
    • Fertilising
    • Feeding
    • Harvesting
  • Outputs:
    • Milk
    • Cattle
    • Crops
    • Meat
    • Manure
    • Hay
  • Reducing soil erosion:
    • Contour ploughing/do not plough up and down slopes.
    • Smaller herds of animals so less erosion.
    • Tree planting as windbreaks/plant hedgerows.
    • Let area fallow.
    • Add manure/ artificial fertilisers.
    • Crop rotation.
    • Terracing.
  • Climate affecting farming:
    • Temperature determines crops grown.
    • Crops need to be grown where there is on adequate growing season.
    • There must be sufficient rainfall for crops to grow.
    • Too much rainfall may flood crops.
    • Cereal crops need sunshine to ripen.
    • In areas with frost/long winter hardy animals may be kept.
  • Physical factors affecting farming:
    • Soil fertility/quality/depth.
    • Amount of rainfall.
    • Relief/height/slope/flat land.
    • Number for frost free days.
    • Drainage.
    • Temperature.
    • Amount of sunshine.
  • Other factors affecting farming:
    • Market.
    • Availability of government subsidies.
    • Quotas.
    • Availability of finance.
    • Land availability/size of farm.
    • Demand/profitability
    • Accessability
    • Labour
  • How relief of land influences farmers' decisions:
    • Crops usually grown on flat/low land as easier to mechanise.
    • Soil's likely to be more fertile.
    • Steep slopes used for grazing sheep/pastoral farming.
    • Thin soils on steep slopes will result in poor yields from crops.
    • Sheep are hardy ond can survive cold temps, on mountains.
    • Sloping land better drained than flat land.
  • Extensive farming: Large scale farming, where farmers grow crops in large fields.
  • Intensive farming: A type of farming where animals are kept in large numbers in a small area.
  • Benefits of mixed farming:
    • Different types of products to sell.
    • If one product does not do well the farmer has others to fall back on.
    • Easier to adapt to market changes.
    • Manure from animals can be used to fertilise crops.
    • Crop waste can be used to feed animals.
    • Farmer has work throughout the year.
  • Why some farmers are subsistence farmers:
    • Poverty
    • Lack of land
    • Lack of markets
    • Technology
    • Tradition
    • Lack of education and skills
  • Effects of food shortages:
    • Malnutrition resulting in physical limitations e.g. Rickets (Vitamin D deficiency) and Kwashiorkor (protein deficiency).
    • Reduces a person's ability to work.
    • Agricultural land may not be well tended.
    • Food production may fall further.
    • Other economic production may fall too.
    • Leading to cycle of ill health and low productivity.
  • How farming damages the environment:
    • Natural vegeration/trees destroyed.
    • Loss of habitat as trees cut down.
    • Poisoning of insects by fertiliser.
    • Impacts on food chain
    • Reduction in biodiversity.
    • Soil erosion.
  • CS: Large Scale Commercial Farming; Lynford Farm in East Anglia, UK:
    Inputs:
    • Temps of 16 °C.
    • 50 mm of rainfall a year
    • High sunshine hours.
    • Very fertile peat soil.
    • 5 full time workers plus seasonal workers.
    • Several tractors, combined harvester, sprays, fertilisers, ventilatEd potato store.
    Outputs:
    • 5000 tonnes of potatoes to supermarkets.
    • 400 tones of peas to canning company.
    • Sugar beet to a factory in Ely (10 km away).
    Wheat to grain merchant - surplus to EU storage.
  • CS: Small scale subsistence farming; Ganges Valley, India:
    Inputs:
    • Rich fertilised soil deposited by Ganges.
    • 21 °C temp.
    • Monsoon rains
    • Rice seeds
    • Small 1 hectare farms.
    • Lots of workers
    • Hand labour
    Processes:
    • Weeding
    • Irrigation
    • Watering
    Outputs:
    • Rice
    • Some wheat