Crops

Sugar, rice, indigo, & tobacco

represent the principal cash crops of the British colonies, particularly in the Southern Colonies, whose economies were built on large-scale plantations that relied heavily on enslaved African labor. These labor-intensive commodities generated immense wealth for Europe, fueled the transatlantic slave trade, and were key components of the triangular trade system, where they were exported from the colonies to Europe.

subsistence farming

farming in which only enough food to feed one's family is produced