Agricultural Practices: From Subsistence to Market Farming

Primary Sector: Agriculture and Food Production

Primary Sector: Obtaining purchase-related activities and food production.

Agricultural activities are limited by physical factors:

• Weather: Tampa. Soft precipitation, moderate.
• Relief: Plan.
• Soil: Depending on your fertility.
• Altitude: Causes a decrease in temperature, unfavorable for crops.
• Latitude: Near the equator, there is more regular sunlight.

Agriculture is also practiced in Africa and North America, where there is less sunlight.

Agricultural Landscapes

Agricultural Landscapes: The landscape is changed to extract agricultural products.

Field Types

• Open fields: No barriers, long and regular.
• Closed fields: Barriers, many extensions, irregular shapes.

Cropping Systems

• Irrigated: Large single-crop.
• Polyculture: Variety of crops in an agricultural landscape.

Irrigation Methods

• Water extracted from rivers or reservoirs.
• Dry rainwater.

Farming Intensity

• Intensive Agriculture: Populated areas where maximum performance is extracted from a plot. Higher cost of technology and manpower.
• Extensive Farming: Sparsely populated areas where the parcels are extensive. Lower cost of technology and labor.

Population Distribution

• Concentrated: Homes grouped in populations.
• Scattered: Isolated dwellings separated.

Target Population

• Subsistence Agriculture: Self-designed for personal consumption.
• Market Agriculture: For sale.

Subsistence Agriculture

Subsistence Agriculture: To produce everything needed for survival. Cultivation techniques are less evolved (hoe, plow), and there is low productivity with few surpluses.

Subsistence Farming Types

• Shifting Cultivation: Fields are obtained by burning forests.
• Extensive Dry Farming: Association of farming and livestock allows regeneration of the soil thanks to animal manure. Triennial rotation.
• Irrigated Rice Farming: Intensive cultivation of rice in wetlands.

Market Agriculture

Market Agriculture: Changes during the Industrial Revolution, products that yield with very little effort thanks to better technology.

Market Agriculture Advancements

• Mechanization in the field: Saves labor, increases production, and lowers prices for agricultural products.
• Specialization of agricultural production: Increases production, produces more quantity, and improves commercialization.
• Rapid commercialization of agricultural products: Accelerates marketing and the use of transportation appropriate to the type of product.

Mediterranean Agriculture

Mediterranean Agriculture: Includes crops like vineyards and cereals, irrigation for fruits, and greenhouse crops like pineapples and mangoes.

Expert Agriculture

Expert Agriculture: Very large irrigated farms with automated production.

Labor-Intensive Farming

Labor-Intensive Farming: Irrigated farms that need a large labor force because their products do not support mechanization.