AP Human Geography Chapter 9 Vocabulary

Agribusiness

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

Agricultural Revolution

The process that began when human beings first domesticated plants and animals and no longer relied entirely on hunting and gathering.

Agriculture

The deliberate effort to modify a portion of Earth's surface through the cultivation of crops and the raising of livestock for sustenance or economic gain.

Aquaculture (Aquafarming)

The cultivation of seafood under controlled conditions.

Cash Crop

A crop that is grown for sale. rather than for the farmer's own use.

Cereal Grain

A grass that yields grain for food.

Commercial Agriculture

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

Market Gardening and Fruit Farming

Relatively small-scale production of fruits. vegetables. and other horticulture.

Conservation tillage

A method of soil cultivation that reduces soil erosion and runoff.

Crop

Any plant gathered from a field as a harvest during a particular season.

Crop rotation

The practice of rotating use of different fields from crop to crop each year to avoid exhausting the soil.

Dairy Farm

A form of commercial agriculture that specializes in the production of milk and other dairy products.

Desertification

Degradation of land, especially in semiarid areas, primarily because of human actions such as excessive crop planting, animal grazing, and tree cutting. Also known as semiarid land degradation.

Dietary Energy Consumption

The amount of food that an individual consumes.

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.

Genetically Modified Organism (GMO)

A living organism that possesses a novel combination of genetic material obtained through the use of modern biotechnology.

Green Revolution

Rapid diffusion of new agricultural technology, especially new highyield seeds and fertilizers.

Herbicide

A chemical to control unwanted plants.

Horticulture

Growing of fruits. vegetables. flowers. and tree crops.

Intensive Subsistence Agriculture

A form of subsistence agriculture characteristic of Asia"s major population concentrations in which farmers must expend a relatively large amount of effort to produce the maximum feasible yield from a parcel of land.

Milkshed

The area surrounding a city from which milk is supplied.

Mixed Crop and Livestock Farming

Commercial farming characterized by integration of crops and livestock; most of the crops are fed to animals rather than consumed directly by humans.

Monocropping (Monoculture)

The practice of growing the same single crop year after year.

No Tillage

A farming practice that leaves all of the soil undisturbed and the entire residue of the previous year's harvest left untouched on the fields.

Organic Agriculture

Farming that depends on the use of naturally occurring substances while prohibiting or strictly limiting synthetic substances, such as herbicides, pesticides, and growth hormones.

Paddy

The Malay word for wet rice, increasingly used to describe a flooded field.

Pastoral Nomadism

A form of subsistence agriculture based on herding domesticated animals.

Pesticide

A substance to control pests, including weeds.

Plantation Agriculture

A large farm in tropical and subtropical climates that specializes in the production of one or two crops for sale, usually to a more developed country.

Ranching

A form of commercial agriculture in which livestock graze over an extensive area.

Sawah

A flooded field for growing rice.

Second Agricultural Revolution

An increase in agricultural productivity through improvement of crop rotation and breeding of livestock, beginning in the United Kingdom in the seventeenth century.

Shifting Cultivation

A form of subsistence agriculture in which people shift activity from one field to another; each field is used for crops for a relatively few years and left fallow for a relatively long period.

Subsistence Agriculture

Agriculture designed primarily to provide food for direct consumption by the farmer and the farmer's family.

Transhumance

Seasonal migration of livestock between mountain and lowland pasture area.

Truck Farming

Commercial gardening and fruit farming, so named for the Middle English word truck, meaning "barter" or "exchange of commodities."

Undernourishment

Dietary energy consumption that is continuously below the minimum requirement for maintaining a healthy life and carrying out light physical activity.

Wet Rice

Rice planted on dry land in a nursery and then moved to a deliberately flooded field to promote growth.

Third Agricultural Revolution

Currently in progress, the Third Agricultural Revolution has as its principal orientation the development of Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO's).

Rectangular Survey System

Also called the Public Land Survey, the system was used by the US Land Office Survey to parcel land west of the Appalachian Mountains. The system divides land into a series of rectangular parcels.

Township and Range Survey System

Rectangular survey system used by the U.S. federal government to divide the land into a grid like pattern designed by Thomas Jefferson to facilitate the dispersal of settlers evenly across farmlands of the US interior.

Metes and Bounds Survey System

Survey of irregularly shaped tracts of land (does not conform to rectangular system of surveys) relies on descriptions of land ownership in reference to natural features such as streams, hills, trees, etc. that was common in English areas in America.

Long-Lot Survey System

Divided land into narrow parcels stretching back from rivers, roads, or canals.

Luxury Crop

Non-subsistence crops such as tea, cacao, coffee, and tobacco.

Primary Economic Activity

Economic activity concerned with the direct extraction of natural resources from the environment\-- such as mining, fishing, lumbering, and especially agriculture.

Secondary Economic Activity

Economic activity involving the processing of raw materials and their transformation into finished industrial products; the manufacturing sector.

Tertiary Economic Activity

Economic activity associated with the provision of services - such as transportation, banking, retailing, education, and routine office-based jobs.

Quaternary Economic Activity

Service sector industries concerned with the collection, processing, and manipulation of information and capital. Examples include finance, administration, insurance, and legal services.

Quinary Economic Activity

Service sector industries that require a high level of specialized knowledge or technical skill. Examples include scientific research and high-level management.