Agriculture: to Plant or not to plant...

Today we introduce chapter 10...Agriculture: the intentional change of the earth's surface for the cultivation of plants and the raising of domestic animals for the purpose of nutrition or profit.  As a quick review... the earliest humans were nomadic hunters and gatherers and moved along with their food source.  Eventually they (most likely in SE Asia) accidently discovered the first type of cultivation... Vegetative Planting (using direct clones of the original plant by cutting off tubers or roots from the original plant and growing the cut off).  As it spread from there, Western India eventually develops seed agriculture (growing from fertilized seeds) which then spreads out to SW Asia/ Mesopotamian area and eventually to Europe and North Africa.  The first combination of Seed agriculture and rearing of animals occurs in SW Asia (according to Carl Sauer).  There are Two main types of Agriculture: Commercial and Subsistence Agriculture.  Commercial Ag is found in MDCs where only about 5% of the population engage in farming because they are productive (due to machinery).  The farms are very large and the purpose of commercial ag is to make a profit.  Agribusiness is an all encompassing term that relates to all jobs dealing with the creation, selling, and packaging of food.  Subsistence ag is found in LDCs where 55% of the population is engaged in farming.  The purpose of farming is to provide food for their family.  Most time is dedicated to farming so having another job is not possible and they have very little extra or surplus food and conse

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