AP Human Geography

Chapter 10

Food and Agriculture

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 AP Human Geography

Chapter 10

Key Issue 1:

Where did agriculture originate?

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 Where Did Agriculture Originate?

•  Invention of Agriculture
–  Prior to the advent of agriculture, all humans
probably obtained needed food through
hunting and gathering.
–  Origins of agriculture cannot be documented
with certainty, because it began before
recorded history.
–  Agriculture is deliberate modification of
Earth’s surface through cultivation of plants
and rearing of animals to obtain sustenance
or economic gain.

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 Where Did Agriculture Originate?

•  Agricultural Revolution
–  The time when humans first domesticated
plants and animals and no longer relied
entirely on hunting and gathering was known
as the agricultural revolution.
–  Agriculture originated in multiple hearths
around the world:
•  Crop Hearths:
–  Southwest Asia:
»  Early crops: barley, wheat, lentil, and olive.
–  East Asia:
»  Early crops: Rice and millet.

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 Where Did Agriculture Originate?

•  Crop Hearths Cont d:

– Sub-Saharan Africa:
»  Early crops: Sorghum, yams, millet, and rice.
– Latin America:
»  Early crops: Beans, cotton, potato, and most
importantly maize (corn).

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 Crop Hearths

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 Where Did Agriculture Originate?

•  Agricultural Revolution
–  Agriculture originated in multiple hearths
around the world continued:
•  Animal Hearths:
–  Southwest Asia:
»  Early domesticated animals: Cattle, goats, pigs,
sheep, and dogs.
–  Central Asia:
»  Early domesticated animals: Horses

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 Animal Hearths

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 Where Did Agriculture Originate?

•  Comparing Subsistence and Commercial

Agriculture
–  Subsistence agriculture is the production of food
primarily for consumption by the farmer’s family.
•  Practiced primarily in developing countries
–  Commercial agriculture is the production of food
primarily for sale off the farm.
•  Practiced primarily in developed countries.
•  Features that distinguish itself from subsistence
agriculture include: lower percentage of farmers in
labor force, highly mechanized, and larger farm size.

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 Agricultural Workers

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 Farmland per Tractor

1 hectare is approximately 2.5 acres.

1 acre is roughly ¾ the size of a football field
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 Farm Size

The average size of a family farm in China is much smaller than in the
United States. (left) Family farm in Anhui Province, China. (right)
Family farm in West Brooklyn, Illinois.
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 AP Human Geography

Chapter 10

Key Issue 2:

Why Do People Consume Different Foods?

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 Why Do People Consume Different Foods?

•  Diet
–  Dietary energy consumption is the amount of
food that an individual consumes.
–  Consumption of food varies around the world,
both in total amount and source of nutrients,
for two reasons.
1.  Level of development
2.  Physical conditions

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 Dietary Energy by Source

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 Why Do People Consume Different Foods?

•  Source of Nutrients
–  Developed and developing regions typically
differ most in their primary sources of protein
consumed.
•  Developed Countries
–  Leading source of protein is meat products.
»  Beef
»  Pork
»  Poultry
•  Developing Countries
–  Leading source of protein is cereal grains.

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 Protein by Source

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 Protein from Meat

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 Why Do People Consume Different Foods?

•  Nutrition and Hunger

–  Undernourishment is dietary energy
consumption that is continuously below the
minimum requirement for maintaining a
healthy life and carrying out light physical
activity.
•  UN estimates 850 million people in world are
undernourished.
–  99% located in developing countries
•  Worldwide, the total number of undernourished
people has not changed much in several decades.

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 Distribution of Under Nourishment

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 Extent of Under Nourishment

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 Change in Under Nourishment

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 AP Human Geography

Chapter 10

Key Issue 3:

Where is Agriculture Distributed?

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 Where is Agriculture Distributed?

•  Geographer Derwent Whittlesey identified

11 main agricultural regions, plus an area
where agriculture was nonexistent.
–  5 present in developing countries
1.  Pastoral Nomadism
2.  Shifting Cultivation
3.  Intensive Subsistence, wet rice dominant
4.  Intensive Subsistence, crops other than rice
dominant
5.  Plantation

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 Where is Agriculture Distributed?

– 6 present in developed countries

1.  Mixed Crop and Livestock
2.  Dairying
3.  Grain
4.  Ranching
5.  Mediterranean
6.  Commercial Gardening

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 Agriculture and Climate Regions

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 Agriculture and Climate Regions

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 Agriculture and Climate Regions

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 Where is Agriculture Distributed?

•  Agriculture in Developing Regions

–  Pastoral Nomadism
•  Pastoral nomadism is a form of subsistence agriculture
based on the herding of domesticated animals.
•  Various approaches combine some reliance on
sedentary agriculture with the herding of livestock.
–  Some pastoral nomads obtain grain from sedentary
subsistence farmers.
–  More commonly, women and children of a nomadic group
tend to crops at a fixed location.
–  Nomads may hire worker to practice sedentary agriculture.
–  Some nomads will remain in a place and cultivate the land
only when rainfall is abundant.

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 Pastoral Nomadism: Movement

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 Where is Agriculture Distributed?

•  Agriculture in Developing Regions

–  Shifting Cultivation
•  Shifting cultivation is characterized by two distinctive
features:
1.  Farmers clear land for planting by slashing vegetation and
burning the debris.
2.  Farmers grow crops on a cleared field for only a few years, until
soil nutrients are depleted, and then leave it fallow for many
years so the soil can recover.
»  Farmers return to a fallow site as few as 6 years
later or as many as 20 years later.
•  Land Ownership
–  Traditionally, land collectively owned by village.
–  Today, private individuals now own land, especially
in Latin America.

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 Shifting Cultivation: Slash and Burn

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 Shifting Cultivation: Slash and Burn

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 Where is Agriculture Distributed?

•  Agriculture in Developing Regions

–  Intensive Subsistence Farming
•  Feeds most of the ¾ of the world s people who live in
developing countries.
•  Farmers work intensively to subsist on a parcel of land.
–  Most of the work is done by hand or with animals rather than
machines.
–  Virtually all available land is used for production.
–  Parcels of land are much smaller than elsewhere in world.
•  Example
–  Wet rice: the process where rice is planted on dryland in a
nursery and then moved as seedlings to a flooded field to
promote growth.

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 Rice Production

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 Growing Rice – Preparing the Field

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 Growing Rice – Flooding the Field

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 Where is Agriculture Distributed?

•  Agriculture in Developing Regions

–  Intensive Subsistence Farming
•  Intensive wet-rice farming is the dominant type of
agriculture in the following places:
–  Southeastern China
–  East India
–  Much of Southeast Asia
•  Climate prevents farmers from growing wet rice in
portions of Asia, especially where summer
precipitation levels are too low and winters are too
harsh.

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 Plantation Farming

Plantation farming is a form of commercial agriculture found in developing

countries. Plantations specialize in one or two crops. This photo is from a
coffee plantation.
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 Coffee Production

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 Where is Agriculture Distributed?

•  Agriculture in Developed Regions

–  Commercial agriculture in developed countries can be
divided up into six main types:
•  Mixed Crop and Livestock Farming
•  Dairy Farming
•  Commercial Gardening and Fruit Farming
•  Grain Farming
•  Mediterranean Agriculture
•  Livestock Ranching
–  Agribusiness is commonly used to refer to these types
of farming listed, because the family farm is not an
isolated activity but is integrated into a large food-
production industry.
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 Where is Agriculture Distributed?

•  Agriculture in Developed Regions

–  Mixed Crop and Livestock Farming
•  Most distinctive characteristic is the integration of crops and
livestock.
–  Most of the crops are fed to animals instead of humans.
•  Typical example devotes nearly all land area to growing
crops but derives more than ¾ of its income from the sale of
animal products. e.g. beef and eggs
•  Permits farmers to distribute the workload more evenly
through the year, because crops require less attention, aside
from planting and harvesting them.
•  Typically involves crop rotation, practice of rotating use of
different fields from crop to crop each year to avoid
exhausting the soil.

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 Mixed Crop and Livestock

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 Corn Production

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 Where is Agriculture Distributed?

•  Agriculture in Developed Regions

–  Dairy Farming
•  Most important type of commercial agriculture in the first ring
outside the large cities because of transportation factors.
•  Ring surrounding a city from which milk can be supplied is
known as the milkshed.
–  Advancements in modes of transportation have
increased the radius of milksheds to 500 km. (300 mi.)
•  Process
–  Dairy farmers typically sell their milk to wholesalers who
later distribute it to retailers.
–  Retailers then sell it to consumers in shops or at home.

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 Dairy Farm

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 Milk Production

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 Changing Milk Production

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 Where is Agriculture Distributed?

•  Agriculture in Developed Regions

–  Commercial Gardening and Fruit Farming
•  Predominant type of farming in southeastern U.S.
•  Commonly referred to as truck farming from the Middle
English word, truck, meaning bartering or exchange
of commodities.
•  Grow many of the following fruits and vegetables that
consumers in developed countries demand:
–  Apples
–  Asparagus
–  Cherries
–  Lettuce
–  Mushrooms
–  Potatoes
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 Where is Agriculture Distributed?

•  Agriculture in Developed Regions

–  Commercial Gardening and Fruit Farming
•  Some of the fruits and vegetables are sold fresh to
consumers, but most are sold to large processors
for canning or freezing.
•  Truck farms are highly efficient large-scale
operations that take full advantage of machines at
all stages of the growing process.
•  Labor costs are kept down by hiring migrant farm
workers.
•  Specialization in a few crops is common.

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 Where is Agriculture Distributed?

•  Agriculture in Developed Regions

–  Grain Farming
•  Distinguished from mixed crop and livestock
farming, because crops are grown primarily for
human consumption.
•  Farms sell their output to manufacturers of food
products, such as breakfast cereals and bread.
•  Characteristics of a Typical Grain Farm
–  Heavily mechanized
–  Farms large in areal extent
–  Oriented to consumer preferences

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 Wheat Production

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 Where is Agriculture Distributed?

•  Agriculture in Developed Regions

–  Mediterranean Agriculture
•  Every site practicing this form of agriculture borders a
sea, and most are on west coasts of continents.
–  Prevailing sea winds provide moisture and moderate the winter
temperatures.
•  Farmers derive a smaller percentage of income from
animal products.
•  Most crops are grown for human consumption.
–  Horticulture, which is the growing of fruits, vegetables, and
flowers, and tree crops form the commercial base.
•  Along the Mediterranean Sea, olives and grapes are two
most important cash crops.
–  Approximately half of the land here is used to grow cereals.

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 Mediterranean Agriculture

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 Where is Agriculture Distributed?

•  Agriculture in Developed Regions

–  Livestock Ranching
•  Ranching is the commercial grazing of livestock over an
extensive area.
•  Well suited for semiarid or arid land
•  Practiced in developed countries where vegetation is too
sparse and soil too poor to support crops.
•  Historically, ranchers sought to move their cattle from
Texas to Chicago, because the cattle were worth more
money farther north.
•  Today, ranching has become part of the meat-processing
industry where new methods of breeding and sources of
water and feed are embraced.

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 Ranching

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 The Chisholm Trail

The Chisholm Trail was used to move cattle

from Texas to railroad stations in Kansas
during the 1860s and 1870s.

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 Meat Production

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 AP Human Geography

Chapter 10

Key Issue 4:

Why Do Farmers Face Economic
Difficulties?

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 Why Do Farmers Face Economic
Difficulties?

•  Challenges for Farmers in Developing

Countries
–  Subsistence farmers must feed an increasing
number of people because of rapid population
growth in developing countries.
•  Food supply increased through intensification
of production via new farming methods and
leaving land fallow for shorter periods of time.

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 Intensive Farming Methods

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 Why Do Farmers Face Economic
Difficulties?

•  Challenges for Farmers in Developing

Countries
–  Subsistence farmers must grow food for
export instead of for direct consumption due
to the adoption of the international trade
approach to development.
•  Consumers in developed countries are willing
to pay high prices for fruits and vegetables that
would otherwise be out of season locally.

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 Population and Food in Africa

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 Drug Crops

International drug trafficking. The export crop in some LDCs are those
that can be converted into drugs.
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 Food Price Index

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 Why Do Farmers Face Economic
Difficulties?

•  Challenges for Farmers in Developed

Countries
– Overproduction in Commercial Farming
•  Commercial farmers suffer from low incomes,
because they are capable of producing more
food than is demanded by consumers in
developed countries.
–  Demand is stagnant in developed countries
because of low population growth.

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 Why Do Farmers Face Economic
Difficulties?

•  Challenges for Farmers in Developed

Countries
–  Overproduction in Commercial Farming
•  U.S. Government has formed policies that
attempt to address excess production.
–  Farmers are encouraged to avoid producing crops
that are in excess supply.
–  The government pays farms when certain
commodity prices are low.
–  The government buys surplus production and sells
or donates it to foreign governments.

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 Why Do Farmers Face Economic
Difficulties?

•  Challenges for Farmers in Developed

Countries
–  Importance of Access to Markets
•  Geographers use the von Thünen model to help explain
the importance of proximity to market in the choice of
crops on commercial farms.
–  Specific crops are grown in different rings around cities
»  1st ring: Highly perishable foods e.g. milk
»  2nd ring: Items more difficult to transport e.g. wood
»  3rd ring: Various crops and pasture lands
»  4th ring: Spacious lands for animal grazing.
•  von Thünen s model can be scaled up for national and
global markets.
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 Access to Markets – Von Thunen Model

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 Why Do Farmers Face Economic
Difficulties?

•  Strategies to Increase the World’s Food

Supply
–  Four strategies are being employed to
distribute food to everyone in the world:
•  Increasing exports from countries with surpluses
•  Expanding the land area used for agriculture
•  Expanding fishing
•  Increasing the productivity of land now used for
agriculture

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 Why Do Farmers Face Economic
Difficulties?

•  Strategies to Increase the World’s Food

Supply
–  Increasing Exports from Countries with
Surpluses
•  On a global scale, agricultural products are moving
primarily from the Western Hemisphere to the Eastern
Hemisphere.
–  U.S. remains the world s leading exporter of grain
»  ½ of the world s maize (corn) exports.
»  Global share has decreased from 18 to 19 percent in the
1970s to 10 to 11 percent in the 21st century because of
more rapid increased in agricultural exports from Latin
America and Southeast Asia.

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 Trade in Agricultural Products

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 Growth in Agricultural exports

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 Why Do Farmers Face Economic
Difficulties?

•  Strategies to Increase the World’s Food

Supply
–  Expanding Agricultural Land
•  Today, few scientists believe that further
expansion of agricultural land can feed the growing
world population.
•  Farmland in some regions is being abandoned for
lack of water.
–  Other land degradation that makes land resemble a
desert-like state caused by humans is known as
desertification.

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 Agricultural Land and Population Growth

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 Desertification

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 Why Do Farmers Face Economic
Difficulties?

•  Strategies to Increase the World’s Food

Supply
–  Expanding Fishing
•  Aquaculture, or aquafarming is the cultivation of
seafood under controlled conditions, whereas fishing is
the capture of wild fish and other seafood.
•  Human consumption of fish and seas has increased
from 27 million metric tons in 1960 to 110 million metric
tons in 2010.
•  Global fish production has increased from
approximately 36 to 145 million metric tons.
–  Only 2/3 of fish caught from the ocean is consumed directly by
humans.
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 Growth in Human Consumption of Fish

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 Growth in Fish Production

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 Major Fishing Regions

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 Fish Production

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 Why Do Farmers Face Economic
Difficulties?

•  Strategies to Increase the World’s Food

Supply
–  Increasing Productivity
•  Invention and rapid diffusion of more productive
agricultural techniques during the 1970s and 1980s is
called the green revolution.
–  Introduced new higher-yield seeds
–  Expanded use of fertilizers
•  Green revolution allowed agricultural productivity to
outpace population growth.
–  miracle wheat seed
–  miracle rice seed
–  miracle high-yield maize (corn)
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 Population and Food Production

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 Genetically Modified Crops in the US

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 Why Do Farmers Face Economic
Difficulties?

•  Strategies to Increase the World’s Food

Supply
–  Sustainable Agriculture
•  Sustainable agriculture are agricultural practices
that preserve and enhance environmental quality.
•  Three principal practices distinguish sustainable
picture (and, at its best, organic farming) from
conventional agriculture:
–  Sensitive land management
–  Limited use of chemicals
–  Better integration of crops and livestock

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 Distribution of Organic Farming

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 Summary

•  Prior to the development of agriculture,

people survived by hunting animals,
gathering wild vegetation, and fishing.
Current agricultural practices vary
between developed and developing
countries.
•  Everyone needs food to survive. The
amount of food and dietary composition of
the food vary between developed and
developing countries.
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 Summary

•  Most people in developing countries are

subsistence farmers, growing crops primarily
to feed themselves. Commercial farming is
primarily practiced in developed countries.
•  Farmers face many challenges to meeting
the dietary needs of a rapidly growing
population when they are forced to rely on
poorer quality land to farm, as a result of land
degradation processes and suburban sprawl
taking away prime farmland.

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