Unit 5 Vocabulary: Agricultural Geography

Agribusiness

Large corporation that provides a vast array of goods and services to support the agricultural industry

Aquaculture

The cultivation and harvesting of aquatic organisms under controlled conditions

Bid-Rent Theory

Explains how the demand for and price of land decrease as its distance from the central business district increases

Cadastral Survey

Systematic documentation of property ownership, shape, use, and boundaries

Cash Crop

A crop raised to be sold for profit rather than to feed the farm family and the livestock; common cash crops are cotton, flax, hemp, coffee, and tobacco

Central Business District (CBD)

A dense cluster of offices and shops located at a city’s most accessible point, usually its center

Cereal grains

Seeds that come from a wide variety of grasses cultivated around the world, including wheat, barley, sorghum, millet, oats, and maize (corn)

Clustered settlement or farm village

A tightly bunched farm settlement that has anywhere from a few dozen to several hundred inhabitants

Columbian Exchange

The interaction and widespread transfer of plants, animals, culture, human populations, technology, disease, and ideas between the Americas, West Africa, and the Old World in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries

Commercial agriculture

Farming oriented exclusively toward the production of agricultural commodities for sale in the market

Commodity

A primary agricultural product or raw material that is bought, sold, and traded

Commodity Chain

A series of links connecting a commodity’s many places of production and distribution

Concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO)

Animal rearing system that confines livestock (such as cattle, sheep, turkeys, chickens, and hogs) in high-density cages only large enough to allow the animal body to grow and to accommodate equipment for feeding and waste removal

Crossbreeding

The act of mixing different species or varieties of plants or animals to produce hybrids

Dairying

A farming system that specializes in the breeding, rearing, and utilization of livestock (primarily cows) to produce milk and its various by-products, such as yogurt, butter, and cheese

Dispersed settlement or isolated settlement pattern

A settlement pattern in which families live relatively distant from one another

Domesticated animal

An animal that depends on people for food and shelter and is different from its wild ancestors in looks and behavior as a result of close contact with humans

Domesticated plant

A plant that is deliberately planted, protected, cared for, and used by humans and is genetically distinct from its wild ancestors

Double-cropping

Planting another crop on the same plot of land as soon as the first crop has been harvested

Extensive Agriculture

Crop cultivation and livestock rearing systems that require little hired labor or monetary investment to successfully raise crops and animals

Fair trade

A certification program that supports good crop prices for farmers and environmentally sound farming practices

Feedlot

A fenced enclosure used for intensive livestock feeding that serves to limit livestock movement and associated weight loss

Fertile Crescent

Area in Southwest Asia that includes the river valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates; the earliest center for domestication of seed plants

First Agricultural Revolution

Period during which the early domestication and diffusion of plants and animals and the cultivation of seed crops led to the development of agriculture

Food desert

Area with limited access to fresh, nutritious foods

Genetically Modified Organism (GMO)

A living organism, including crops and livestock, that is produced through genetic engineering

Grain farming

A highly mechanized commercial farming system that specializes in the production of cereal grains; requires large farms and widespread use of machinery, synthetic fertilizer, pesticides, and genetically engineered seeds

Green Revolution

The U.S.-supported development of high-yield seed varieties that increased the productivity of cereal crops and accompanying agricultural technologies for transfer to less developed countries

Hearth

A center where innovations or new practices develop and from which the innovations or new practices spread or diffuse

Herbicide

Pesticide designed to kill or inhibit the growth of unwanted plants (weeds) that compete with crops

Hybrid

The offspring of two plants or animals of different species or varieties

Intensive Agriculture

Crop cultivation and livestock rearing systems that use high levels of labor and capital relative to the size of the landholding

Intercropping

The farming practice of planting multiple crops together in the same clearing

Irrigated agriculture

Farming that relies on the controlled application of water to cultivated fields

Large-scale commercial operation

A large-scale farm oriented exclusively toward the production of agricultural commodities for sale in the market

Linear settlement pattern

A settlement pattern in which buildings are arranged in a line, often along a road or river; limited to areas where legal systems dictated that property lines must be rectangular

Livestock ranching

The practice of using extensive tracts of land to rear herds of livestock to sell as meat, hides, or wool

Long-lot survey system

A unit-block surveying system whose basic unit is a rectangle that is typically 10 times longer than it is wide

Market gardening

A small-scale farming system in which a farmer plants one to a few acres that produce a diverse mixture of vegetables and fruits, mostly for sale in local and regional markets

Mechanical reaper

A machine used to harvest grain crops mechanically; patented by Cyrus McCormick in 1831

Metes and bounds

Survey system that uses natural features such as trees, boulders, and streams to delineate property boundaries

Mixed crop/livestock agriculture

A diversified system of agriculture based on the cultivation of cereal grains and root crops (such as potatoes and yams) and the rearing of herd livestock

Monocropping (monoculture)

The cultivation of a single commercial crop on extensive tracts of land

Multicropping

Planting two or three crops per year on the same land

Nomadic herding (nomadic pastoralism)

A system of breeding and rearing herd livestock, such as cattle, sheep, or goats, by following the seasonal movement of rainfall to areas of open pasturelands

Organic farming

The production of crops and livestock using ecological processes, natural biodiversity, and renewable resources rather than industrial practices and synthetic inputs

Pesticide

Material used to kill or repel animals or insects that can damage, destroy, or inhibit crop growth

Plantation

Large landholding devoted to capital-intensive, specialized production of a single tropical or subtropical crop for the global marketplace

Second Agricultural Revolution

Period that brought improved methods of cultivation, harvesting, and storage of farm produce that began in the late 1600s and continued through the 1930s

Shifting cultivation

The cultivation of a plot of land until it becomes less productive, typically over a period of about three to five years; when productivity drops, the farmer shifts to a new plot of land that has been prepared by slash-and-burn agriculture

Subsidies

Guaranteed prices for staple food crops

Subsistence agriculture

Food production mainly for consumption by the farming family and local community, rather than principally for sale in the market

Township and range

Land survey system created by the U.S. Land Ordinance of 1785, which divides most of the country’s territory into a grid of square-shaped townships with 6-mile sides

Truck farm

A scaled-up version of market gardening, with more acreage, less crop diversity, and a stronger orientation toward more distant markets

Urban farming

The practice of growing fruits and vegetables on small private plots or shared community gardens within the confines of a city